The Coldest Knight
by Grand Master Darkstorm
Summary: Damian Wayne, son of Bruce and Selina travels to Gotham City and finds himself swept in the storm of Black Mask's criminal organization plaguing Gotham into a state of chaos. He becomes Batman with the help of John Blake and fights to regain his city from a political and criminal stand point and along the way, he'll learn more about his family and the original Batman.
1. Chapter 1: The Legacy

**Okay, so the whole Batman Beyond concept wasn't working too well, so I decided to go a different route with Damian Wayne since Helena is so popular, I wanted to showcase Bruce Wayne's cannon son. More notes down below.**

_16 years after Bane's occupation _

"Yield Dad!" he cried

Damian Wayne stood over his father, Bruce Wayne, the former Prince of Gotham and once known as Batman, with his sword tip pointed at his chin.

"You gave your footing for a killing stroke." Bruce smiled as he slammed his sword against the ice, Damian could only look down temporarily as he plummeted into the water below.

They were in the same mountain range in the Himalayas that Bruce had once trained in years ago with Ra's al Ghul, but that was a life he didn't live anymore. They were practicing their sword techniques, a form of fighting Bruce had taken a liking to when he trained, of course, the circumstances of his and Damian's training was the same.

He reached a hand inside the hole and pulled his son out by scruff of his collar, Damian shivered; his body was freezing cold from the few minutes he spent under the ice, he knew his dad would definitely help him.

* * *

"Rub your chest Damian, your arms will take care of themselves." Bruce said sternly to his son

Damian tucked his arms close to his chest and slowly rubbed as his chin hit the base of his collar bone, he felt the heat begin to rise in his sixteen year old body from both the fire and from his own body.

"You're doing well Damian." Bruce smiled "I'm very proud of you."

"Yeah, yeah." Damian scoffed "How do you even know this stuff dad? You were a business man, not a fighter."

Bruce shook his head; the smile on his face still remained "I'm going to be honest with you Damian, your old enough that you can understand." He leaned back "There's things your mother and I kept secret from you over the years, now your mother will be furious, but I'll talk her down."

Damian listened with full attention as his father talked about his early life in Gotham, how his grandparents Thomas and Martha were killed by a man named Joe Chill, how he spent seven years travelling around the world to understand the criminal mind and was eventually found by Ra's and trained by the League of Shadows.

"I returned to Gotham and decided to originally fight the Mob, but it soon turned into much more. I decided to fight crime as a symbol, as a man, I could be ignored or broken, but this symbol was made so I could fight against crime and do what the GCPD could never do."

"And what was this symbol?"

Bruce sighed "The symbol….do you remember when we used to tell you about Batman?"

Damian thought for a moment then looked at his dad "That was you wasn't it?"

His father nodded silently to himself "Yes, yes it was. For almost ten years I fought criminals as Batman, but when I developed feelings for your mother…I faked my death."

"The nuclear bomb right?" Damian asked again

He nodded "Yes, when the bomb exploded, detached the bomb, and flew to safety, your mother nursed me back to health and now we have our estate in Florence."

Damian nodded without saying another word, he had a new understanding for his father, now that he understood all of this about him, originally they didn't get along too well, and his mom always said it was because they were so much alike.

"I…I've wanted to be like you dad." Damian admitted, his eyes locked with his father "I always wanted to be like you."

Bruce smiled at his son "I'm glad, I've have always loved you Damian."

His son looked at him confusingly "Your mom and I talk remember."

He looked away "Never thought I would ever admit it, but mom thought I should, and here I thought we hated each other."

"I see it as more that we didn't understand each other." Bruce admitted "Which was to be understandable, considering the secret I kept from you all this time."

There was a pause as father and son looked at each other, Damian felt happy, like he did when he was a kid again, he and his dad getting along better now was a benefit to him.

"Dad, can I ask you something?"

"Sure, what is it?"

"Mom…how did you meet her?"

Bruce smiled "That's a story for another day; just don't mention the pearl necklace she owns."

* * *

_9 years later…_

Damian readjusted his tie for the tenth time already, every time he thought he got it right, it was wrong soon afterwards.

"Here, let me."

Damian turned to his mother, Selina Kyle stood in front of him and readjusted his tie "You are just like your father, always trying to be perfect."

"Mom, I can do my own…"

"Stop it Damian, no arguing." Selina tucked his tie into place "There we go." She smiled and looked at him in the mirror "You really do look like your father."

Selina was right, Damian did look like Bruce, and he didn't notice it until he turned eighteen years old after a trip with his mother to visit to Rome to see the Castel Sant'Angelo, which was at one point a prison used by Renaissance Italians but was converted over to a museum in 1901.

He had inherited his father's wavy hair style, his mother's chocolate brown hair color, and his father's hazel eyes. He always did wonder how he managed to look like his father when both of his parents were always catching people's eyes, regardless of gender.

He smiled and pecked his mom on the cheek as he grabbed a hold of his suitcases and the pair walked out into the main hallway, they lived in a small estate outside of Florence, looking out his bedroom window, he could see the walls guarding Florence and on the right he could see the beginning of the Apennine Mountains.

"Well, well, it's that time huh?"

Bruce walked into the hallway, a cane kept him up for support, after Damian's training was complete at twenty, he had begun to feel pain that had been endured from his time as Batman, Selina wasn't too happy whenever she saw him in pain, which was to be understandable; it was hard for him to see. His hair was fully gray at the age of sixty-three, but he still looked really young, just distinguished.

Selina was the same way, fifty-two years old and she still looked the same, minus a gray or two, she still looked absolutely beautiful, she had put a few pounds on but she still kept an amazing figure none the less.

"Gotham will be proud to have you Damian." Bruce smiled and patted his son's shoulder "Now, I do have a name of a man you should look up while you're there."

"Who is he?"

"His name is John Blake…Robin John Blake, when I left Gotham, I left the cave to him."

"Do you know where I can find him?"

"No, but I like to think he's still in Gotham, hopefully he has a family by now."

Damian nodded, this was going to be exciting for him, he always dreamt of going to Gotham City, the birth place of his parents and possibly his had his father not faked his death to protect the people of Gotham.

"Now, just one more thing, if you're going to use the Wayne name, just make sure you come up with a story, we can't afford to have the public think I'm alive, it needs to remain that I'm dead."

"Bruce." Selina interjected

"Selina, I won't hear of it, I've worked too hard for what we have here for me to give it up because some paparazzi questions Damian too much."

Selina sighed as Damian smiled at her, his mother always did seem to take his side on many issues when it came to Gotham, he knew she wanted him to be his own person, but he did agree with his dad that he did need to remain dead.

"I'll be fine." He looked at Bruce "What ever became of Alfred?"

"He's living with his wife now, he finally got a chance to settle down and have his own life outside of the cave." Bruce smiled as he thought of his old butler and godfather

"Okay." He hugged his father and kissed his mother who had suddenly felt the tears flow down her cheeks "I love you both, I'll call when I can."

Selina never was the type to let her emotions show, always kept things bottled up until Damian was born, but now that he was leaving, everything was flying out of her again.

Bruce smiled and hugged Selina as Damian closed the door behind him.

* * *

Damian sat on the trans-Atlantic flight heading to Gotham City, he was going back to the city of his roots, as he looked out the window, he heard a pair of feet moving from one end of the plane to the other, things seemed a little too quiet for him anyway, he was used to the noise and the hustle and bustle outside of his own window.

A pair of figures stood in the middle of the suite, he glanced out of the corner of his eye, they wore Italian Armani suits, black skull looking masks covered their faces, and ahead of them were two men who were doing the same actions.

"I'm going to ask you two sit down." One of the stewardesses demanded as she approached

"Certainly." The masked man on the right spoke

He drew a pistol from his belt and fired it, the bullet made impact into her chest, she fell down in a pool of red blood staining her blue vest and white blouse as the other men drew their guns.

"No one is getting out alive!" They yelled at the same

Damian smirked and shook his head, the murderer smiled as he approached "You got a problem pretty boy?"

Damian looked out the window "Why don't you lot put your guns down before someone really gets hurt?"

"Well, well what are you Batman or something?" The man smiled "Not even one man can take all of us on."

"Watch me, and I won't have to hurt you if you put your gun away from my face."

Everyone around Damian looked at him with shock and some with fascination, the murderer smiled.

"I don't think so."

Damian smiled "Then forgive me." He grabbed his gun hand and twisted his arm until the bones broke

The murderer cried out in pain as Damian slammed his face into the chair next to him, he tumbled to the ground as his partner raised his gun about to shoot the youngest Wayne, Damian immediately moved as a bullet made impact on the compartment.

The young Wayne immediately struck the partner in the stomach as his two accomplices fired bullets from their revolver side arms. With each one carrying eight bullets, all sixteen shots landed in the partner's back, Damian had squatted down, he quickly drew the gun and fired two shots, each one making impact on their legs, they fell to the ground as Damian stood and cast the gun away.

He wiped his brow as some more stewardesses came to check on him "Find me something to tie them up with, then contact the pilot let him know he needs to radio Gotham International and have the GCPD ready upon our landing."

He sighed as he sat back down in his chair, was any place safe anymore? Who were these men? He just hoped Blake had the answers he needed when he arrived in Gotham.

**So I know Damian may seem a bit over powered but believe me, I'm trying to show case the child like ruthlessness mixed in with the original concepts from Batman Begins so expect a lot of similarities. Bruce and Selina will be making more appearances as the book progresses, so stay tuned for two and the return of an old friend!**


	2. Chapter 2: An old friend

Police were waiting when the passengers were leaving the plane one by one into the lobby, Damian stood to the side, his suitcases by his side as he was answering questions by a police officer. His white collared shirt was kept ironed, a black sport coat, black tie and matching pants, the GCPD badge on his belt next to his sidearm.

"I told them to sit down, that we didn't need to do this, they tried to open fire, and I just retaliated." Damian informed him

The officer stroked his brown mustache "And you do realize who those men are do you?"

"No sir." Damian kept his composure, his hands in his pockets

"They work to Roman Sionis a known crime boss in this city…" the officer paused "a powerful crime boss in the city."

"Detective Gordon!? Stand down!"

Gordon and Damian turned to a middle aged man with a graying beard, slight tan in his skin, his brown and graying hair was kept close cropped, dark gray collared shirt was covered by a dark black sport coat, black pants and matching shoes.

"Commissioner Akins, I was just wrapping up here."

"Gordon, head out." Akins looked at Damian "This man is the one who took out the terrorists?"

"Sir, they were Sionis' mercenaries, not terrorists."

"We'll get them down to the MCU and they will be determined how dangerous they truly are." He held a hand up to the young Wayne "What is your name?"

"Damian…" Damian thought for a moment, he couldn't use Wayne "Damian Astore."

"Well, stay out of trouble Mister Astore." Akins looked him over "I've seen you before."

"Sheer coincidence." Damian shrugged

As Akins walked away toward the security detail, Gordon stood back in front of Damian.

"I'm sorry about him, since my father retired; Akins has been fighting crime on every turn, he's kind of headstrong."

"I understand that one." He looked at him "Gordon….James Gordon Jr?"

"Yes that's right." Gordon looked at him, readjusting his glasses "Why do you ask?"

"Oh it's nothing important." He suddenly remembered "Do you know where I can find a man named John Blake around here?"

"Blake? Heh yeah, I know where he's at."

"Can you tell me?"

* * *

Gordon's instructions sent Damian to a restaurant known as the _Late Night Bar and Grill, _it was a very nice restaurant with some flowers on the outside with people walking outside of it, but no line leading to the door.

Damian got out of the cab he paid for at the airport, paid his fair and walked inside the restaurant through the front door. On the inside, it was a nice place, booths were on one side of the restaurant while tables and chairs were on a side with a large bay window setting, it did seem nice enough with the bar at the back with a series of stools in front, and he calmly walked over to the bar and sat down.

One of the employees, a young man about five years Damian's senior approached him "Hey, hey, we're not open yet!"

"I'm not here to order anything, I'm looking for John Blake, and I was told this would be where I could find him."

"Hang on one second." The man stepped into the back "Hey Johnny boy! You got company!"

The man stepped out with a wash basket, soap and water and began to polish the tables as another man walked out; wearing a dark gray polo, blue jeans and black shoes, a cane was the only thing holding him up, his black hair was starting to show spots of gray.

"So I take it you're here for our help wanted position?" The man asked

"No, no I'm not." Damian smiled "I take it your John Blake?"

"Yes I am, so why are you here young man?"

"I've come bearing a message." Damian leaned in close to Blake and whispered "Our mutual friend sends his regards…Nightwing."

John's dark eyes went wide as he realized who this young man was; he quickly looked to his employee "Raphael, take ten would ya?"

"Sure thing Johnny." Raphael set his things down and walked out the back door, a pack of cigarettes in his hand

John sighed as Raphael left and then turned to Damian "How do you know who I am?"

"As I said, our mutual friend sends his regards." Damian smiled at him

John looked at the man, wavy chocolate brown hair, hazel eyes….then it dawned on him.

"Your Bruce Wayne's son aren't you?"

Damian smiled "Yes sir. I am."

"Well, I would love to know where the hell they've been at for twenty years."

* * *

John led Damian to his car, a black ford Taurus, out in the back of the building "So, why are you here Damian? You never told me."

"I wanted to see Gotham City, my parents always talked about this city and I wanted to see it for myself."

John got into the driver's seat while Damian got in the passenger's "What about the restaurant?"

"I'm the owner, not the G.M.; I don't need to be there, besides got some personal matters to take care of at home." He started the engine and pulled out of the drive way leading onto 2552nd street.

Sometime passed and not a word was muttered between the two men, Damian just watched with awe at the sights, different buildings, gangs on street corners and the litter piling the streets. He could see the difference between Florence and Gotham, yet for some reason, he liked Gotham more it was late fall early winter outside his window, the brown leaves were almost off of the trees and a light covering of snow covered the grass and parts of the sidewalk.

"So…how did your dad know I was Nightwing?" John finally spoke up

"My dad has kept an eye on everyone he gave things to, Lucius, Alfred and you." Damian responded, a bit of a chill in his voice

"Well, if you're going to operate in this city." John made a turn heading into the Palacades "You're going to need to know a few things if you're going to live here."

The building they drove toward was abandoned, but still looked beautiful with light brown brick foundation, large bay windows and a circular driveway, the grass was still trimmed and a worn down sign was in front of it.

John and Damian quickly stepped out of the Taurus and approached the building, as John walked to the front door, Damian walked to the sign, it was old, but it was still readable. He silently read the words to himself.

_Thomas and Martha Wayne Memorial Boys Home. _

"John? Why are we at a boy's home?" Damian asked

"This _used_ to be a boy's home. Problem is now a days the Wayne Foundation doesn't see it right to support these types of things." John replied as he attempted to open the lock

"Why not? Didn't my dad make this home an orphanage?"

"Correct, but because Wayne Enterprises almost went broke after your dad died, they had to cut funding to certain places, boy's homes and orphanages just so happened to be one of the many categories."

Damian walked up the stairs "And I take it there were other things that did cause it to come back?"

John nodded as he broke the door open by breaking the lock with his cane "Oh yeah, military contracts that went into prototype stages, never actually worked out, every one they bring up, they're quickly shut down. Production of new vehicles, security systems, basically the new board is trying to make Wayne Enterprises the new main power source of Gotham."

The two proceeded inside, Damian didn't have any other comments to make about the old house, only on close observation; they could see dust covered the place, the electricity wasn't working and everything just seemed run down.

The pair silently walked down the main hall and into the lounge, a large wall of library books still sat on the shelves and a large piano was not even covered. John moved his hands over the keys and tapped a few keys.

The shelf almost hitting the wall quickly moved out of place, John walked over and moved the shelf aside, revealing a hidden passage way leading to an unknown location.

"Come on inside." John offered as he walked inside

Damian looked around and followed John inside; the door slid shut and slowly began to descend.

* * *

The elevator slowly descended down, Damian felt impatient, he was wondering where John was taking him but he knew he was excited none the less. It emitted a small musical tone from the speakers.

"So, where are we going?"

"The place your dad left me years ago."

The elevator dinged and the door opened to a large metallic catwalk leading to a larger platform with a giant computer on the right side, a large circular platform was near a waterfall. A large sunken platform was near the main area with a series of costumes encased in glass behind the computer.

"What the…"

"Welcome to the Batcave, I made some modifications to the cave following Bruce's departure." Blake walked over to the computer and sat down at the chair

Damian walked down the platform and looked at the encased outfits, one he recognized as a plated armor, a second one was red and green, and it was extremely small with a domino mask over the head of a mannequin, another one with a mask similar to the tiny set, but was the same plated armor as the first, but with a blue bird like symbol going from the chest to each shoulder blade and a third one was full black with a gold bat like symbol in the center.

"So, I would assume you want to know about those?" Before Damian could even speak, he began to speak again "The first one is your father's suit, the third one is mine and the other two belonged to two people you don't need to worry about."

Damian looked at them "What became of Gotham?"

"Excuse me?"

"What has made Gotham like this?" Damian faced John "When my father died, this city was prosperous, it had a future."

John sighed "Well, I can tell you about that." He sat down in the chair and began to type, the giant screen above him came to life above his head "First things, first, you're going to need who to avoid in this city and why, so, let's start with the plane terrorist's boss."

The screen began to flicker and showed a man about six feet one, with a black skull mask and wore a white suit with a dark gray shirt and a white tie.

"This is the man that caused the plane and caused major problems in this city, Roman Sionis, also known as his street name Black Mask, a known crime boss, his origins…are unknown, but best we can figure out is that he came here with a group of about five men called the False Facers, they quickly moved into to Falcone's districts and took control of everything the crime family once did."

John pressed a few more keys and Commissioner Michael Akins appeared "You've already met him, the Commissioner is a man of few words but he prefers to let his actions speak for his words, his biggest goal is to succeed James Gordon and make a name for himself." John sighed "In my opinion, he has his head so crammed up his ass that when the crap hits the fan, it'll be too late."

He repeated the process as Damian came closer, the picture of Akins joined Roman's picture and a third one appeared, this man was short, bald on the top of his head with gray hair along the sides of his head, his blue eyes were covered by a pair of glasses "This is Quincy Sharp, the known warden of Arkham Asylum and a man who seems to having help. He's currently up for election for Mayor after the previous one died of old age. He's also extremely dangerous; he's attempted to kill several of the inmates of the city."

Damian looked at the three men, his eyes focused in on Roman "Why hasn't anyone taken down Sionis?"

"He has a lot of people on his payroll, cops, lawyers and judges." John looked at Damian "Why?"

"What if I said I want to? That I will continue my father's work."

"As Batman? That's a pretty big commitment."

"Criminals aren't complicated John." Damian looked at him "I won't be able to do it as Damian Wayne, as a man, but as Batman….as Batman I can become indestructible."

"Well then Mister Symbol, I can point you in a few places to get started." John smiled

**Alright chapter 2 is up and I absolutely loved the way it turned out. I'm going to try and do a modified version of Damian Wayne's Batsuit since this isn't a cloth suit so I'm going to try and modify it a bit so it at least looks close to it and John will be a prominent character in this story along with some others who will appear later. **

**So stay tuned for chapter 3 where we'll be introduced to some more characters and the start of the assault against Black Mask**


	3. Chapter 3: Securing his rightful place

_Six months prior…_

"There are some things you will want to know about Gotham City before you head there Damian." Bruce looked at his son "Gotham is a city of bearcats, politicians and the criminally insane; you will want to keep your allies close because anyone of the three, can stab you in the back."

Damian was sitting in his father's study with Bruce who was looking at the window, a robe over his body, his beard was grown in and his hair hung at the base of his neck with it slicked back.

"So is that all?"

"No, the Wayne family has had a major place in the city for six generations, now seven counting you. My family built up Wayne Enterprises and now I don't know what has become of it. I left it in the hands of someone I can trust, Lucius Fox, he's a trust worthy man who has kept things afloat, but I stopped checking a few years ago, mostly the Fox family can be trusted, but you just have to keep an eye out."

Bruce walked over the seat across from Damian and sat down "You will want to keep yourself level headed if you reveal yourself as a Wayne, but you will need to keep a firm story about my death. I don't want people swarming this estate trying to get information on how I survived."

* * *

Damian walked up the stairs of Wayne-Powers, his hair was slicked back, his eyes were focused as he proceeded toward the board room, and he could tell they were in session, the doors were closed and a young brunette was sitting behind the table, clicking away on the keyboard while talking on the phone.

"Yes, Mister Powers will be available Mister Steele, just send the paper work up." The woman replied and hung up

Damian approached the desk "Good morning, I'm here to see Mister Powers."

"Name?" The woman didn't look up at him

"Uh Damian Wayne." Damian put on a convincing smile, his father would be proud

The secretary looked up at him in shock.

* * *

Within the board room, a large table sat in the middle of the room as the Wayne-Powers board was in the middle of a meeting, another man stood by the window, his pen moving from one finger to the other in fluent motions.

"We are showing heavy growth in these sectors, the military contracts are actually making things turn up."

"I don't think Bruce Wayne would have considered a five year continuation with the military contracts." An older member of the Wayne Enterprises board spoke up

The young board member walked toward the man who spoke "That was twenty years ago…Brown." He began to walk toward his seat "I think we can say that after all this time, we cannot say what Bruce Wayne and Lucius Fox would have done in this position."

Brown sighed "Paxton, just because your father was diagnosed with cancer does not mean you can suddenly make decisions for us."

"Arthur, I will not hear about it anymore. Bruce Wayne is dead and we cannot keep focusing on his decisions, his decisions almost drove us into the grave and we're almost out. We need to keep going." Paxton sat down at his desk and pressed his intercom button "Lucy…?"

There was a pause and no response on the intercom system, Paxton patiently tapped his fingers on the table.

"Lucy?"

Again, nothing, now Paxton was getting annoyed, his brow furrowed as he stood up and stomped to the door, and opened the door.

* * *

Damian smiled as he held onto Lucy, he was teaching her how to ballroom dance, and he knew this was going to put him at a spot when the board came out but he didn't care.

"Step one. Step two." Damian looked down at their feet "Very good."

"And this is how you learned in Italy?"

"Actually," Damian blushed "my mom taught me how to dance."

The door opened and Paxton looked in frustration. "What is going on out here?"

Damian let go as Lucy blushed and sat down "Its Wayne Enterprises Mister Powers," he looked over at Paxton "I'm sure we can manage."

"Bruce?"

"Not exactly." Damian held up a hand "Damian Wayne."

The two men shook hands, Damian nodded as he and Paxton shook hands, he looked at the board "Gentlemen, ladies, we'll discuss this more in detail tomorrow."

"Follow me to my office." Paxton motioned

Damian followed; the only sound that could penetrate his ears was the sound of their shoes clicking on the floor as the moved from the board room to the back room where Paxton kept his office.

"Have a seat." He motioned

The younger Wayne gently sat down as Paxton poured them both a glass of Champaign for each of them.

"Your father played a great part of shaping Wayne Enterprise's newest chapter…"

"And also his downfall." Damian replied coldly "I heard what you said in the board room."

"Right, well, you know he was responsible for a clean energy project that nearly bankrupted him and the stocks he bought that went dead…"

"Mister Powers you know those were proven to be fraud in the courts." Damian snapped "Don't insult the dead sir."

"Of course, and I have nothing more but the utmost respect for your family Mister Wayne."

"I bet you do." Damian took a sip of his drink "And I'll want a confirmation that my inheritance is confirmed by your lawyers and I am looking for a job."

"Oh?"

"I just want to get to know the company that my family built." Damian replied simply

"Did you have any idea where you would start Mister Wayne?"

"I don't suppose the Applied Science's division still around?"

"No." Paxton leaned against his desk "Lucius Fox had it merged years ago."

"Then why don't I take a look at these military contracts, see if they need a fresh face?"

"Very good, I'll let Mister Fox know you're coming."

"Fox?"

"Luke Fox, Lucius' grandson. He's in charge now."

Damian nodded as Paxton raised his glass "You're the only one left of the Wayne Family, welcome home."

Damian nodded "Well, if my inheritance is set, then I'll be on my way. I have an appointment with some relators for a place of my own."

He set his glass back on the table and walked to the door leading back to the board room "Oh and Mister Powers, I don't appreciate the comments made about my father."

"I'm being honest; your father wasn't exactly a business man."

He looked at him "The last person I saw insult my family, he's not six feet under because he couldn't keep finances up because he was fired after the scandal with a microwave admitter. He almost drove the Narrows into utter war."

With those words he took his leave, not wanting to engage Paxton in anymore talk, he had a goal, and he knew what he needed to do, or who to climb over to get to it.

* * *

As he stepped out of Wayne-Powers, he spotted what appeared to be John Blake sitting in a SUV toward him, he motioned as Damian got inside.

"So, what did I tell you?"

Damian leaned back "You warned me, said things were bad, I just didn't think this bad."

"It's sad." John looked at the building "You have Roman Sionis controlling the streets and Paxton Powers controlling the corporations, basically we can't win."

"When was the Fox family kicked out?"

"Well, Lucius retired about six years after Bruce died, his son Morgan took control of the board and appointed his son Luke to be in charge of the military projects division."

"Trustworthy?"

"Luke is a bit thick headed, but he can be trusted."

"By the way." Damian reached into his coat pocket "Anything I need to know about Paxton?"

"Nothing aside from the corruption scandal he ran back in Bludhaven, tried to contaminate their fish supply. Derek pulled him out of it, got diagnosed with throat cancer and left everything to Paxton."

"What would it take to bring him down?"

"Exposure of his corruption in Gotham, he's been running finances to the ground in Wayne Enterprises, worse than what happened with the clean energy project. Rumor has it he's taking bribes from Roman."

"Any judges?"

"Judge Drake, he's big on organized crime. You want to bring him down; you need evidence to convince him otherwise."

"I'll find something." Damian replied as John began to pull out onto the main road

"Oh by the way, what happened to you using your pseudonym?"

"Eh, it was enough to get me in the city, but now I want everyone to know who I am." Damian replied

"Good to know, very good to know." John continued to focus on his driving "Though rumors of your presence are already known to the VIPs of the city."

Damian gave him a confused look as John held up a golden flyer, the flyer had an iceberg on the front with two penguins flying to the side with the worlds "_VIP WELCOME BACK THE WAYNE FAMILY, A PARTY HOSTED IN THE ICEBERG LOUNGE BY OSWALD COBBLEPOT." _

"Oswald Cobblepot?"

"Big time contender and a rival of your family."

"My dad never mentioned him."

"He just came back about three years ago. He has done a various amount of charity work to protect Penguins, but don't let his generosity fool you, he's a mobster if I've ever seen one. His Lounge is the coldest place in the city for not only criminals, but also temperature."

"I think I'll want to see this place for myself."

* * *

The Iceberg Lounge was just as Blake described, cold, and covered in decorative ice from head to toe, with ice shaped chandeliers, an in-ground pool about a foot below the dining room floor was in the middle of the room with a giant iceberg sticking out, going from the water to the rim of the pool, as Damian looked down, seals and penguins were playing on it.

"Ah Mister Wayne, I wasn't expecting you until this weekend."

The new figure that approached Damian was a man about five foot two, with slicked back black hair, blue eyes with one of them had an oval glass over it, he wore a black tuxedo with a top hat on his head and an umbrella was being used as a cane, the most predominant feature was his nose, which pointed out a lot farther then a normal nose.

"I'm sorry Mister…."

"Cobblepot." The man's voice was very dignified "Oswald Cobblepot, the one throwing the party for you this weekend."

"Oh yes, I am terribly sorry sir." The two men shook hands "I do wonder how my presence became known so quickly."

"Being _a business_ man of my stature has its advantages Mister Wayne. Do not worry; Gotham has been in need of another Wayne in the city again." Cobblepot smiled

"Well, either way, I do appreciate it sir."

As Cobblepot began to speak again, one of the waitresses, who wore a really short uniform that showed off her arms and legs, the same black and white color scheme as the master of ceremonies and a top hat on her red hair, spoke gently in his ear.

"Oh I am terribly sorry Mister Wayne, please, feel free to have a drink at the bar or order something from our menu." Cobblepot readjusted his umbrella "And please, send the check to me."

With that, the man waddled off, Damian chuckled a bit and walked toward the bar, as he approached, a young woman was sitting at the bar, her blonde hair was tied back, she wore a dark blue top with a black skirt and a set of heels, and she seemed to be extremely cold, proof being the slight shiver coming from her body.

"Can I help you sir?" The bartender asked

"Whatever you have on the tap." Damian replied as he sat down and removed his jacket

He gently slid it over the woman's frame and allowed it to drape down to the seat, she looked over at him and smiled.

"Damian Wayne?"

Damian gave her a confused look "I'm sorry, have we met before?"

The woman smiled "You don't remember do you? High school? Starling City? Victoria Queen?"

Damian's eyes went wide as he shook his head "Of course! How could I forget?"

Back when he was still living in Italy, he was part of a foreign exchange program to Starling City, he had gotten close with a lot of people there, but Victoria was definitely someone different.

"So what are you doing here in Gotham?" Damian asked as he took a sip of the drink presented to him

"I work here; I'm a reporter for the Gotham Gazette now." She smiled warmly at him "You still look as handsome as ever."

"Handsome? Well," Damian's face turned a bright shade of pink "I…I….don't know about that."

"Oh I know about that." She stood "Well, I guess I should get going, we should catch up sometime."

She handed him his jacket turned on her heel and began to proceed out of the lounge, Damian didn't know what came over him, maybe it was the mystique with the way she walked, or maybe what she said threw him off of his game, but he didn't have any control over what came out of his mouth.

"Tori! Wait!"

She turned gently as Damian walked toward her "Cobblepot's got this thing going on this weekend ….and…" his face turned a brighter shade of pink "and…I was just wondering if you wanted to go with me?"

Victoria smiled at him and gently placed a hand on his arm "Sure."

She gently reached into her purse and pulled out a business card and placed it in his hand "This is my number, call me."

Damian smiled "I will."

She smiled back at him, it was a warm smile that was complimented by the dimples that formed on her face, and she gently leaned forward and planted a kiss on his cheek. Her head reached to her shoulder as she looked at him, gently winked and took her leave from the bar.

Damian could only smile as his hand touched his cheek, this was going to be fun.

**Okay, I really have to appreciate everyone who has said so many nice things about my story. We now have three new characters introduced to the lure, Cobblepot aka Penguin, Paxton Powers and Victoria Queen. Now, this is the daughter of Laurel and Oliver Queen, she will not become the next Green Arrow or Black Canary, but something new I have planned, but don't think her parents didn't influence her like Bruce and Selina influenced Damian. Cobblepot will not become Penguin in this book, I am still debating if I want him to be a major villain or a minor one. **

**And there will not be any sign of Blight aka Derek Powers in this story either. The villains in this story have been already planned out though anticipate the Nolanverse version of a few more characters coming up in the next few weeks. **

**School's wrapping up but I am now going to start working in the next few weeks so expect things to definitely slow down soon, I'll try to get done as much as I can and I won't leave you guys in suspense for long. Next week we'll be seeing the new Fox of the story.**


	4. Chapter 4: Applied Sciences

"Defense contracts, eco experimental studies, consumer products, all in the prototype stage; none in production on any level."

"None?"

Luke Fox stood from the chair he was sitting in, shut down the tablet he was using and proceeded to the lights "What did they tell you Mister Wayne?"

Damian shrugged "They didn't tell me anything."

Luke smirked as he flipped the switch; a series of floodlights came into activation giving illumination to the dark room they had been standing in "Powers told me exactly what it was when I was sent down here…prison."

As the men walked, Damian kept his hands in his pockets and looked around at various crates, vehicles and tables throughout the room, his eyes kept looking in pure fascination.

Luke Fox was about ten years Damian's senior with dark eyes, matching trimmed hair, a business suit with a blue tie and a gray jacket and pants.

"Here we go." Luke took to one of the crates and pulled the drawer out, a series of medium toned gray plates with what appeared to be a skeletal foundation "Kevlar plates under a titanium tri weave skeletal foundation for advanced infantry and recon operations."

Damian gave a low whistle as he ran his fingers over the plates. They were not ridged but not soft either.

"Why wasn't this put into production?"

Luke smiled "The suit was deemed too heavy for a SEAL team six member who was performing recon missions and was about six foot two and weighed about two hundred and so odd pounds of mostly muscle, the suit is designed to adapt to the user, it adds on about fifty pounds to the user."

"Bullet proof? Knife proof?"

"For the most part, just don't get into a fight with a fully automatic assault rifle. You'll feel it."

Damian gave a low whistle again as Luke closed the door without another word.

"Now would you like to see the belt that goes with it?"

"There's a belt?"

Luke nodded and pulled out a black belt with a circular buckle and a series of round pockets on various points on it.

"There's a reason this suit is designed for recon." Luke turned the buckle and with a flash, the belt disappeared

"What the hell is that?"

"Camouflage system, puts everything behind you in front of you. You'd be amazed what Lex Corp and Wayne Enterprises can come up with in twenty years." Luke smirked and turned the buckle again

He then looked at Damian "So Mister Wayne, what is your interest in it?"

"I wanna borrow it for free soloing."

"Free soloing?"

Damian smirked "Yeah you know, free climbing."

"You're expecting to find mercenaries trying to kill you during this climb?"

"Well, it all depends on the mountains, climb too close in the Middle East and you're bound to run into trouble."

Luke chuckled "Well, at least you have your priorities straight." He then got serious and looked at him "Mister Wayne, answer me something, are you planning what I think your planning?"

"What am I planning?"

Fox pulled out his cellphone and clicked a button, Damian looked at Luke then heard a ping as the security cameras shut down, the normal blinking red light was now dull.

"Powers set those up to keep an eye on me, as far as he is concerned, I'm just showing you around the place." Fox looked at him "Are you planning on continuing your father's legacy?"

Damian looked at Fox with a bit of shock "How…how the hell did you know about that?"

Fox chuckled "Grandfather Lucius couldn't keep his mouth shut, he told only me and my father about your dad and Batman. So, you're planning on becoming Batman?"

Damian nodded "Yeah, yeah I am."

Luke smiled "Well Damian, I think you have what it takes."

Damian smiled and looked around "What's that?"

He pointed to a car that was standing over to the side, it had a camouflage colored paint, with fins, a missile tank was pointing out, what appeared to be a mask grill, large plating above the front tires, but it seemed very sleek.

"Oh the Raptor? Oh you wouldn't be interested in that."

* * *

Damian pulled up to the upper floor of the building, Luke sat next to him in the passenger's seat as he drove, they were on the floor above where they were in the Applied Sciences building,

"The Raptor is a recon vehicle like the suit, notice how quiet it is." Luke held a finger up

Damian nodded, he did notice the engine wasn't making much noise; of course the sound might have been coming from the echo of the empty room.

"During combat in Afghanistan, they would patrol the dessert and try to find nuclear reactors."

"Why didn't it go through?"

"The sand would release from the tires, maybe quiet, but it doesn't work too well with its surroundings." Fox sighed "Just small technical errors."

Damian drove with one hand as he went around for another lap, a determined look on his face as Fox spoke again.

"Over here on the steering wheel." He pointed to two small buttons on the wheel "Activates two ten millimeter Gatling submachine guns with a hundred rounds per clip."

Damian pressed the buttons, the machine guns, round rotating machine guns on a stand appeared from the side of the car, and a small screen came to life showing what was ahead of them.

"This is your friend or foe system, you program the target and say to fire, it'll fire the designated amount of rounds you tell it. The vehicle is voice activated, you say any command and it'll complete it." Fox explained

Damian took a wide turn and the Raptor leading it to a turn and a skid along the floor. Damian smiled and put the car in park.

"So, what do you think?"

Damian smiled "Does it come in black?"

* * *

Another punch to his face caused a fast amount of blood to flow from his lip. Officer Wilkins looked up at his torturer, a man in a black skull mask glared down at him with piercing brown eyes through the holes of his mask.

"Please, I don't know anything…" Wilkins grunted in pain

The man in the mask raised the crowbar in his and slapped it into his gloved hand, his captor was bloody, and his blue uniform was stained with blood, along with his dirty blonde hair. This interrogation was taking longer than he thought.

"Who has been trying to run me out of town?" He growled

"I don't…."

The skull faced man slammed the crowbar into Wilkin's face "Who!?"

"It…It's Sharp! Quincy Sharp!"

Before he could strike again, Roman handed the crowbar to one of his men "Why?"

"He's…he's trying to clean up Gotham." Wilkins responded, fear in his voice as it hitched "He claims once he becomes Mayor, he'll run you out of town."

The masked man reached into his white suit and drew a revolver; he pointed the barrel at his head and unclicked the safety.

"No please! Spare me!"

The man laughed "No, I don't think I will." He pressed the trigger and fired

The bullet made impact in the middle of his forehead, Wilkins slumped over in a hump as the man drew his gun back.

Another skull masked man approached him as the first man spoke to his associate.

"Track down Sharp, keep an eye on him. I don't want any interference with the shipment tonight."

"What of Wayne?"

"Wayne?" The man pondered "No, don't worry about him….for now."

"Yes Black Mask."

Black Mask smiled as his associate walked away, he knew things were picking up and this was how it should be.

* * *

Blake typed on the Bat computer, he had gone through the numbers over and over again, and he just couldn't understand why this was happening.

"John?"

John looked over to a woman rolling over in a wheelchair to him, her red hair was pulled back, a set of glasses over her blue eyes. Blake smiled and approached her and they gently kissed.

"Sorry Barb, just distracted right now."

"Did you find Roman?"

"No, but I did find a shipment coming." Blake smiled "I think it's time our boy got his wings."

Damian looked over at Blake and Barbara, he had gotten to know her over the weeks, and she had been the daughter of Commissioner James Gordon, and the one to operate a suit known as Batgirl, though an accident Blake refused to speak about caused her to loose function in her legs and had been in a wheelchair since.

He looked at his father's suit, he had acquired a set of retractable arm blades like his father's and was finishing his cowl, a graphite, leather cowl that looked like his dad's, flexible but hard enough he wouldn't be able to get too much head trauma.

"Damian! Got a job for ya!" Blake yelled

Damian smiled as he began to suit up, this was going to be fun.

**Okay, so I am following the bandwagon with Blake married to Barbara Gordon, but I feel like my version is different, and her accident will be explained either in this story or the next one. And I'm sorry this chapter was so short, real brain fart with this and I want to do the shipping yard chapter.**

**Hope everyone enjoys and stay tuned for the return of Batman!**


	5. Chapter 5: The return

The shipping yard was silent as a mouse as the clock struck midnight, the men slowly were offloading crates from the bow of a shipping vessel, each crate was slowly being moved as another man stood off to the side with two men from the ship.

"I don't know what you're so scared about, it's not like the cops will be interfering." The man known as the Rhino spoke to two men

The two men, both of Turkish decent, looked at each other than the man on the right, a mustached man by the name of Yusuf looked at Rhino "You have your drugs, all two hundred kilos of it, where is our reward?"

Rhino chuckled and motioned forward as two mercenaries carried two female bodies over their shoulders "They're knocked out and they will be for a little while longer, mild sedatives."

Yusuf shook Rhino's hand with a grin on his face "I'm sure our boss will be happy, tell me how you did this."

"The boss has a friend who handles these kind of things." Rhino smiled

As the two men spoke, one of Rhino's men walked down the harbor line, his rifle pointed forward, his eyes looking at the bay and at the shadows beside him, he didn't expect trouble but he had to be sure.

The mercenary didn't expect something to grab him and pull him into the shadows; his vocal cords gave out a loud yell as his head was slammed against the concrete wall.

* * *

Rhino turned his head and drew the pistol from his belt "I would suggest you get going my friends, someone is trying to be a hero."

Yusuf and his associate Ahmet nodded and headed for the boat behind the mercenaries Rhino gave them. He moved and gave orders to his mercenaries, each one moving through the port and going a few feet into shipping complex.

Two more men walked along the pathway, their side arms out, they walked toward the location of their fallen comrade, an open crate was in their direct line of vision.

"Tyler?" The first mercenary called out "Hey come on Ty this crap aien't funny no more!"

The second mercenary was locked in fear; his eyes looked above as he didn't move a single muscle, afraid of what was above him.

The first mercenary, Boone looked at his comrade "What's wrong?"

Boone's comrade, Rocky pointed upwards, as both men looked up, they were met with a figure standing on the underside of a crane looking down, a black mask was held over its face and black armor covered its body as it swooped down and landed on Boone, sending a fist into his head, body hitting concrete and knocking him out.

Rocky grabbed Boone's gun and started to run as fast as his feet could take him, he didn't get very far as the figure moved with a ghoul like stalk and jumped Rocky, slamming him to the ground and met a similar fate to Boone.

Rhino walked to one of his remaining mercenaries who looked at him with fear "Sir, you'd better get going."

"Oh yeah right." Rhino removed the safety from his sidearm "Like as though I'd let Roman have my ass for abounding my post."

Another mercenary, his anxiety on high as he looked around, his machine gun pointed out, the figure moved in front of him, the mercenary fired his gun with a fast precision, as the rounds drove into the area in front of him.

He quickly reloaded and looked up, the figure was there again, as it moved, and he fired again until his second clip was spent.

"Where are you!?" He shouted

The figure was behind him "Here" It grabbed the mercenary from behind

Rhino was now getting scared; his feet gave out as he sprinted to his truck. He quickly climbed into the back seat and slammed the door closed. Rhino reached down and grabbed a double barrel shot gun from the floor, he quickly checked the rounds in the barrel, his hands trembling as he closed the barrel and put his finger on the trigger.

"What the hell are you?" He whispered

A fist broke window to the door and grabbed Rhino by the collar and slammed his head through the door, breaking it off the hinges and sending him to the ground with a thud.

Rhino's vision was starting to blur as the attacker grabbed him by the collar and slammed him into the side of the car that was when the False Facer looked at him, a black cowl with two pointed ears with black eye slits looked at him.

"I'm Batman." The figure growled and slammed his head into Rhino's

The impact from the car and the toughness from the cowl knocked Rhino out. Batman looked at the slumped figure and looked at the boat. He reached into his belt and pulled a small gun out and fired at a nearby lamp post, it shot out and did a ring around the pole and sent Batman up, and he used this as an accelerator to boost himself up into the air.

The cape around his body he used as a support system to fly through the air and land on the deck of the ship, several mercenaries ganged up around him, they were Turkish soldiers, not the ones Roman gave Yusuf.

Batman quickly reacted, dodging several punches by ducking down low, then rising and as one fist drove toward him; he immediately caught it and twisted the arm, slamming his elbow into his face. He slammed his fist or foot into the face of several of the circle members.

Finally there were two, as they attacked, he ducked and dodged, grabbed the second mercenary by the wrist and twisted the arm around toward the shoulder blade, bone cracking emitted into the air as he slammed both men into each other by his boot, sending them over to the edge and into the water. He finally turned his attention to the main part of the ship, the control room.

* * *

Yusuf and Ahmet stood in the control room, the women they took, bound and gagged to a set of chairs, both men looked at their prey, there were four of them, two brunettes, one blonde and one red head, each one was still under the effects of the drugs.

Getting back to Istanbul, let alone get these women ready for the slave trading within the cities walls was going to be difficult, once these women were declared missing, the police would be scouting all over.

"Shall we go?" Ahmet asked

Yusuf nodded as Ahmet took the controls of the boat and started the engine.

Batman finished off the last mercenary in the stairwell with a punch to the face, this job was getting easier and easier by the mercenary. He went to his belt and moved the dial buckle, his suit changed to the same color as his background and immediately his moved, reaching the bridge of the boat in record time.

Yusuf and Ahmet were not aware of his presence, nor would they ever know. He immediately dove through one of the windows, and struck Ahmet while his back was turned, a fist to his spine and an elbow to his temple.

As Yusuf turned to face their attacker, Batman deactivated his cloaking, exposing himself.

"What the hell are you?" Yusuf whispered as Batman approached

"I'm Gotham's reckoning." Batman replied as he struck

* * *

Rhino slowly came to, he felt himself to be lighter than before, like he was hanging off of something. That was when he realized he was being hung by his ankle by what appeared to be a wire. He looked down as the ocean was below him, and near his face was a man, this Batman.

Batman stood in front of Rhino, his black armor was stainless after all of the fights he had just endured, a two layered collar rested on his shoulders as his cape dangled down beneath him and it seemed to meet at his knee caps, his black cowl gave a sense of fright, at first Rhino didn't think it could be Batman, but that was when he saw the small bat symbol on his chest.

"Who are you and who are you working for?" Batman growled

"Heh," Rhino chuckled "I aien't gonna tell you shi…"

Batman moved his head and raised his foot, Rhino felt the cord go lower and his body along with it, he almost screamed until he was pulled back up, face to face with Batman.

"Okay, I go by Rhino, as for my boss…I work for Roman Sionis." His voice began to show fear

"Black Mask?"

"That would be his street name."

"How many people does he have?"

"That all depends." Rhino smirked with his black skull mask "How much are you willing to."

Batman moved his foot again, and Rhino's eyes went wide "Okay, okay, there are six of us, we call ourselves the False Facers."

"What does Roman want with Gotham?" Batman's raspy voice replied

"I don't know, he contacted us, we False Facers come from all over, Metropolis, Starling City, Bludhaven, Gotham, you name it, we're from it."

"Why recruit you?"

"I have no idea, why don't you ask the big man himself."

"I'm counting on it." Batman sneered "Who drugged those women on the boat? Where were they going?"

"Istanbul and I have no idea; all I know was that I was supposed to deliver them to our Turkish friends and be on my way with the drugs."

Batman sighed "Well, who else works for Black Mask?"

"I don't have any freakin' idea, but I'm sure you'll find out eventually."

"I'm counting on it." Batman smiled as he drew Rhino back

* * *

Commissioner Akins met with Detective Gordon and his partner Detective Harvey Bullock and several other GCPD members who sealed off the surrounding area, several officers walked off with a few women who were crying their eyes out.

Akins looked over to several men bound by their wrists "Black Mask's men?"

Gordon nodded "They claim they were attacked…."

"By who?"

"By a giant bat."

Akins' eyes went wide, he was a young cop back when he was around, but it was impossible, he died years ago "It's impossible, Batman cannot be back."

As Gordon spoke with the Commissioner, Bullock looked up at the surrounding area and his eyes caught on something "Guys, you found your proof."

Akins looked up at a floodlight shooting into the sky; the symbol of a black bat was captured in the interior.

"This is impossible."

* * *

Batman sat in the driver's seat of the Bat, his eyes looked down at the police scene and a smile spread on his face, as he looked at the internal clock, it just hit one in the morning, he shook his head and removed his cowl.

Damian Wayne smiled and ran a gloved hand through his sweat covered locks, now it begins.

* * *

Black Mask felt the floodlight hit him even from behind his skull mask, he felt the sweat drip as the four mercenaries he hired stood in all four corners of the room, his hands folded together on the table.

"Look, I've got a bit of a problem, and you are the only woman with the skills who can handle this problem."

The female figure looked at Black Mask, her own face was covered by a white mask, no markings on it aside from two eye holes, her body was covered in a black leather suit, her blonde hair was tied back in a ponytail and a set of guns nested on her belt and a bow and arrow was held near her

"What's the job?"

"I need you to kill the Batman, rumor has it he's returned, one of my guys is already in the GCPD's hands and I want to make sure none more get in. So, do we have a deal?"

The masked female looked at the four men around her "And if I refuse?"

The men began to move in "Then I'm afraid I will no longer be in need of your services."

"Pity."

"For who?" Roman asked

"Your men."

She immediately dove for her bow and arrow, held two arrows in her hands, aimed and fired them from her bow. The arrows dove into the chest of the two men, each one being impaled by a single arrow, blood stained at their feet and continued to leak from the corpses.

"So, am I still allowed?"

"The money will be wired to you." Black Mask stood "Same procedure as usual."

"No need to worry Roman." The pair shook hands "The Black Rose is your assassin."

**Alright, so Batman has returned! For those of you who are wondering, I combined certain aspects from Damian's Batsuit from the alternate ending from Batsuit #666, the main suit is basically the Dark Knight and the Dark Knight Rises just remade in my image and the belt is a combination of Earth One and Batman Beyond. **

**Also The Black Rose is an original character of mine and I know this is called _The Coldest Knight _but don't worry, the reason I call it this will be unveiled soon! And some more familiar faces will be coming around in chapters to come. **


	6. Chapter 6: Mysteries in the Iceberg

The curtains were drawn the next morning giving the dark room a brightening experience; Damian immediately covered his face with his sheets.

"Bats are nocturnal!" He groaned

Blake smirked "It's your ten in the morning wake up call."

Damian looked at him "Ten am? Son of a bitch!" he punched the bed "I used to be able to sleep till noon when I was a kid."

Since his return to Gotham, Damian secured the inheritance his father left him and managed to get a two story house in the Palacades, it wasn't the Wayne Estate but it would do just fine for him, sure, it was weird having a big house to himself, but it's how Damian preferred it that way.

"What day is it?"

"Saturday, Cobblepot's party is tonight at seven."

Damian threw his pillow over his head "Damn it."

"Nervous?"

"Hell no." He moved his pillow away and leaned forward, he could see that Blake was giving him this look that said '_you're lying through your teeth.'_

"About the party no, about going out on a date with Victoria Queen…hell yes." Damian sighed running a hand through his bed head

"Well, you're going to do fine." He looked around "Where's your suit?"

"Blake, I haven't even unpacked!" He motioned to the boxes still out in the hallway

It was true, Damian hadn't unpacked since his things arrived in Gotham, he had yet to break it to his parents he had become Batman, he could see their reactions now, his mom would more than likely be proud of him, his dad on the other hand….knowing his dad he wouldn't be too happy about Batman making a return, but it had to be done to stop Black Mask.

"Well, you're lucky." Blake opened Damian's closet, his best suit was hanging on the hanger, still in the plastic wrap "Your mother ironed this for you."

Damian smiled and leaned back, his mom and he had a pretty good relationship, sure, he and his dad were rocky when he was a kid, he always had a strong feeling his dad was keeping something from him and by sixteen, he found out the truth, his dad was Batman and he told him everything about his training when he was Damian's age.

"You miss them don't you?"

Damian nodded "Aside from going out of state for high school, I haven't really been away from my parents, from helping my mom around the house after my dad's spinal surgery to travelling with my dad for training from fourteen to twenty-four."

"Well, why don't you call them?"

Damian shrugged "I might, not sure yet."

Blake looked at him "Well, you made the front page." And motioned to the paper by Damian's night stand

Damian took the newspaper and silently read the title silently to himself _Batman Returns? Unknown person spotted in a Batman suit._

"Theatricality and deception are powerful agent's mister Blake." Damian stood up from the bed

Blake gave him another confused look as he stood using his cane for support "What are you talking about?"

Damian smirked and shook his head "Something my Dad once told me."

* * *

The night time soon arrived; VIPs were receiving the red carpet treatment as they walked down the red carpet catwalk leading into the Iceberg Lounge, as the cars began to move up, a pure black Lamborghini pulled up to the catwalk, stepping out of the driver's seat, Damian took a heavy sigh of relief, the day was struggling enough without having to worry. As he proceeded to the passenger's side, cameras began to flash as they took pictures.

He put a finger to his pocket and pressed something which caused the cameras to turn off, as the camera men looked at their cameras trying to determine the problem, Damian opened the door.

"After you my lady." He smiled and took her hand

Victoria Queen stepped out of the sports car, her red dress hugged her body, it wasn't form fitting but fitted perfectly, her blonde hair hung down a bit below her shoulders perfectly straightened and a small bit of makeup covered her face along with red lipstick.

"Well, well, looks like Gotham is known for some good things."

"And here I thought it was just my natural charm and good looks."

Damian took her arm laced in his as they walked down the catwalk going into the Iceberg Lounge.

"You clean up well Damian." Tori remarked checking Damian over

"Thank you; though I will admit it, you're missing something." Damian smirked and reached into his coat pocket

"And that would be?" She gave him a confused look

Damian smiled and stopped at the door, pulling out a diamond necklace from within his pocket, Victoria's face turned into a shade of pink in pure shock.

"Damian! It's beautiful!" She smirked "You shouldn't have."

He smiled gently at her and clasped the necklace around her neck, Victoria smiled and gently moved her hair so it draped down to the middle of her back.

"I just feel like a beautiful woman should have beautiful things."

Victoria shook her head and pecked him on the cheek "You are too sweet Prince of Gotham."

Damian rolled his eyes as they approached the main door to the Iceberg Lounge, Cobblepot stood outside, umbrella being used as a cane as two heavy muscled bouncers.

"Ah Mister Wayne," Cobblepot smiled "and Miss Queen, I didn't realize you two were acquainted."

Damian sighed "Oswald, I do appreciate the party."

"Of course, of course Mister Wayne." Cobblepot slapped his bouncer in the stomach

As the guards moved, Cobblepot bowed and let his arm point toward the door "Do proceed inside and tell them to send the check to me."

Damian nodded as Victoria smiled warmly, gently rubbing against Damian's waist.

"Thank you Mister Cobblepot."

Cobblepot smiled as the pair walked inside "Stupid kids." He grumbled

* * *

The party was well under way, many big leaguers from businesses, upper class citizens who had more than a penny to spend. Damian walked inside with Victoria still clung to his arm, as he scanned the room, Batman's instinct took over as he took in the room.

Several politicians, some judges and occasional member of the Wayne Enterprises board were among the high class citizens. The waitresses were helping customers wearing the same uniforms Damian had noticed before, though they now wore black domino masks over their faces, but something seemed off about them, they seemed to be moving robotically, their eyes had a glazed look in them, but they seemed to be operating normally.

The pair was escorted to their table, Damian pulled Victoria's chair out, his eyes continued to look around the room, there wasn't much room for cover, nor was there any place to hang from and listen in, he knew being Batman in here was difficult.

"Damian, just sit down and relax okay?" Victoria rubbed his arm

Damian smiled and sat down across from her, as a waitress gave them a bottle of wine on ice and two glasses, Damian's eyes went wide when he saw Cobblepot again.

Cobblepot stood into the shadows, speaking to a man he didn't recognize, the man wore a mask with an orange side on the left and black on the right, the orange side had an eye hole, the man wore pure black armor with shoulder pads on them were shotgun bullets, a thread of bullets was lined along his back with duel swords on his back and what appeared to be a pistol attached to his belt.

"Wonder who that is." Damian motioned to Cobblepot

Victoria looked back "Huh, that's odd, I never knew Cobblepot associated with mercenaries."

"Maybe body guard."

"Maybe something else." Victoria said grimly

Damian looked, he really wanted to know what they were talking about, and he could tell Victoria had read his mind, her green eyes told him that she knew what he was thinking.

"I'll be right back." Victoria stood

"Where are you going?" Damian smirked as he took her hand

Victoria smiled and kissed his "My job."

* * *

She readjusted the domino mask over her eyes as she looked at herself in the mirror, she was wearing the same uniform as the waitresses, the woman she took the uniform from was bound and gagged in the stall of the ladies bathroom, she gently tied her hair back and hid the necklace Damian gave her in her purse.

Gently moving, Tori stepped outside and looked out to make sure Damian wasn't watching but upon inspection, the table was empty, not even Damian was sitting there.

Her steps were graceful, calm but beautiful as she moved toward Cobblepot and the masked mercenary, she immediately grabbed a tray with two glasses of Champaign in them.

"Look, I know what Roman is requiring of me, I am doing all I can, the shipments are being brought in on my watch, your shipping is being handled." Cobblepot said, anger growing in his tone

"Champaign sir?" Victoria asked, mocking a slight French accent

Cobblepot looked at her; a glazed look in her eyes, the penguin smiled "Thank you my dear."

He handed the other glass to his associate as Victoria turned her back to them and headed toward the kitchen, as she looked down, her cell phone showed Cobblepot's name, phone number and a rotating bar with the words forced par on them, when it was complete, she headed back toward the bathroom to change.

* * *

Damian slipped a ski mask over his face as he headed toward the back alley way of the Iceberg Lounge, mercenaries stood outside, moving their hands together trying to get warm, their faces concealed by black skull masks.

"So why did the boss make us tag along with this guy again?"

"We need to make sure Penguin gets the last shipment in Frank, jeeze you're freakin' dumb as hell."

"Don't blame me Gabe; I try the best I can." Frank retorted

As the third mercenary walked toward Damian's location, his eyes kept looking forward, his submachine gun in his arms; he continued to walk as Damian slammed his head into the wall.

Frank and Gabriel turned back to the masked man approach them, they quickly raised their guns in retaliation and opened fire on Damian's location who quickly ducked out of the way long enough for them to reload, as they slapped the new clips in, Damian attacked.

He shot his fist into Frank's throat then disarmed him, slamming the butt of the weapon into his head knocking him out, when Gabe took aim; Damian moved with quick precision to knock his gun away then slammed his back into the wall, his arm going over Gabriel's throat.

"Who is the man in there?" Damian growled as his Batman voice "The masked one speaking with Cobblepot."

Panic shirked in Gabe's voice "We never knew his name, but he works for Roman Sionis as a hired mercenary, we don't know his name, only his alias."

"And that would be?"

"Deat…" Gabe whispered but his voice grew louder "Deathstroke!"

Damian looked at him with curiosity "Thank you." He was met with his head slamming into the wall

* * *

He quickly slipped back into the Iceberg lounge and slipped his ski mask into his coat pocket, he knew things would be intense, but now he had to look into Deathstroke, which was impossible, Deathstroke died years ago.

As he walked back to his table, Victoria was waiting with her purse in her hands.

"Vics I am so sorry." Damian leaned in and kissed her cheek

"Its fine, listen work called and they need me to resubmit tomorrow morning's article." Victoria smiled "So we have to take a rain check."

Damian frowned "I'm sorry again."

"Don't be, just take me home, we can meet up tomorrow for breakfast?"

"Sure. It's on me." He kissed her on the cheek again

* * *

"That's impossible, Deathstroke died years ago, there should be no way he's alive."

Damian returned to the Batcave after dropping Tori at her apartment, he had to get answers about Deathstroke and he knew Blake would be the only person with those answers.

"Well according to Black Mask's thugs, Deathstroke is working for Roman."

"As I said, it's impossible. The original Deathstroke was Slade Wilson, he operated in the ASIS, and he died in 2010 on this island."

Blake flipped back to the computer and began to type furiously on the keys; on the screens an island appeared with gray clouds over head.

"The island is known as Lian Yu, or also known as…"

"Purgatory." Damian muttered

"Yes, after a series of events that has been unrecorded, Slade was confirmed dead by none other then…" Blake tapped another key

A picture appeared of a young man in his early fifties, his blonde hair was graying along with his mustache.

"Oliver Queen." Damian muttered again

"Yup, Oliver spent five years on that island."

"So what would Deathstroke be doing in Gotham?"

"Well, I know one way to find out."

Damian looked over to the Bat suit rising from its container.

* * *

Victoria listened to the ongoing recording of Cobblepot and the mercenary over and over, she had a hard time understanding, but she knew someone who would want to hear it.

She pulled a phone out of the drawer of her desk and began to dial "Good evening, got something you'll want to hear."

On the other end, Black Mask smirked "Good, very good."

**Okay, sorry for the lack of updating, this was due to two things. One, severe writer's block, didn't know how I was going to incorporate things into this chapter and two, work has been kicking my butt. Also, I am a big fan of the CW series _Arrow _hence the inspiration for Victoria Queen, but I am saying this right now, this is structured like the comics where references are made with no actual crossovers. **

**So I hope everyone enjoys and I will update as soon as I can!**


	7. Chapter 7: The Confrontation

The night time air gave way to the cold of the winter that had just started in Gotham, snow blanketed the ground as it continued to fall from the sky in a beautiful display, to some, they would sit for hours and just watch it fall and blanket the ground and roads in a white blanket, but for tonight, it was completely different.

Frank sat in the back seat of the Ford SUV, his associates were beside him, they had a mission and one mission alone, deliver the package and not to let anything get in the way of the mission, not even the rumors of Batman's return.

Some in Black Mask's organization thought it was a naughty rumor started within the organization to fool Roman's associates into giving up their operation in Gotham while others were die hard that Batman's return was real and that he was hunting down the boss.

The car continued to swerve in and out of the main drive, the road was deserted as they pulled up to a warehouse in the middle of the Narrows.

The three men jumped out of the car with a large container having to be carried by Frank and his other associate James.

As James and Frank moved inside with the package, the leader slapped the back window with his hand "Move it out!"

* * *

The trio moved inside, the leader Matthew walked toward the back of the room, his submachine gun slung around his shoulders.

"Place it there boys." Matthew's voice was deep as he pressed the lights on

With Christmas coming up soon, the lights turned on with green, red and blues, but soon turned off as some of them broke.

"Oh come on." Matthew tossed his mask on the table "Frank, check the breaker."

Each man wore a ski mask over their faces, with black skull masks, the trade mark of Black Mask's gang, though they weren't as detailed as Roman and the False Facers. As Matthew and James waited for Frank to return, they didn't notice they were being watched.

Frank slowly began to stalk toward the circuit breaker, his machine gun pointed forward, he silently approached his pray, silently opening the breaker's front panel, and he quickly grabbed a flashlight and placed it between his teeth.

A figure silently approached him, Frank didn't see it coming as his head was slammed into the breaker, the flashlight breaking teeth and stuck in his mouth as his body slumped down onto the floor.

* * *

Matthew and James looked up when they heard the noise, they silently began to move, James took the lead as he pointed his M4 forward and kept looking out, he knew Batman struck from above or from the shadows.

The floorboards broke from below him and James was grabbed by his ankles and dragged down below into the bottom floor, his body making impact.

"No…no…no!" James yelled as his head was slammed into the ground by a fist

Matthew looked down "James? Hey James quit screwing with me!"

Matthew fired his gun into the hole, hoping to hit something, there were no cries of pain; the bullets must have made impact on the ground. He quickly reloaded and attempted to try again, when he clicked the trigger, no bullets came out.

"What the hell?" He tried clicking the trigger again, but again nothing, as he ejected the clip and checked it again

Every bullet was in the clip, so he couldn't understand, he began to move backwards in fear, as he hit something, and he turned around in shock. Matthew pressed the trigger of his gun, hoping to frighten him, only to have the gun knocked out of his hand, the figure's hand wrapped around his throat, its head made impact.

As Matthew fell to the floor, Batman stood over top of him, sure he could have interrogated the men, but that wouldn't help at all with what he was looking for.

He walked over to the box the foot soldiers brought in; the name _LexCorp _written on the front, Batman slammed his foot into the front and the lid flipped open, within a series of fragmentation grenades with a detonator hooked up to an explosive.

The timer quickly hit five seconds Batman immediately ran for the wall and dove into it, the wood broke as the explosive detonated and sent the young vigilante forward, his body slammed into the snow.

As he began to climb up, a figure stood in front of him, Batman recognized him as Deathstroke, the same mercenary he had been hunting the last few days.

"Glad you received my invitation." Deathstroke smirked behind his mask

Batman immediately charged as he grabbed one of the swords from his back, Deathstroke slashed forward in the air, Batman kept dodging, slash after slash he moved his body with swift motions, he used his arm guards to block the sword and attempted to elbow Deathstroke in the face but missed and was met with a kick to the stomach.

He was sent flying backwards and into the snow, as he stood, Deathstroke began to move again, Damian held the sword between his arm guards and moved his arms to the sides, breaking the sword into a multiple fraction of pieces.

Deathstroke began his assault using his shortened sword, he slashed forward like it was a dagger, slashing with angry precision, he was intending on killing Batman this time around. Batman quickly went on the retaliation by blocking Deathstroke using his arm guards, elbowed the assassin in the head but he got the upper hand and grabbed Batman by the throat and held the dagger up to his throat.

Batman acted fast by slamming his foot into Deathstroke's foot, as he was sidetracked, the masked crusader slammed his fist into the assassin's stomach then slammed his elbow into his back, sending him into the snow.

_Now, let's finish this. _Batman walked over to Deathstroke and slammed his foot into his back "Tell me where Black Mask is."

Deathstroke smiled behind his mask "Sorry, you'll never know."

As Batman prepared a batarang to throw into Deathstroke's chest, he felt it leave his hand and fly into the snow, Batman sighed and walked over to his weapon, upon further inspection, an arrow pierced it in the middle.

Another arrow flew through the air and landed right beside him, Batman turned his head to the new foe that stood before him in a form fitting black suit, a hood concealing the person's head, a white full face mask showing only the eye slits.

"Who are you?" Batman growled

The voice coming from the mask was feminine but seemed to be robotic as well "Call me the Black Rose." Her voice showed no sign of emotion

Another arrow flew as Batman caught it with his hand and snapped it in two, quickly gaining ground, Black Rose began her assault with her black bow, using it almost like a club, Batman blocked it with his arm guards, she continued her assault, each hit being blocked hit for hit by his arm guards, finally Batman got the upper hand and tossed her bow aside a few feet away.

Deathstroke quickly stood and ran over to help, his pistol drawn, Batman heard the click as he took off the safety, he knocked the pistol away and slammed his fist into his face, drawing his grapple gun, aimed and fired, it wrapped around Deathstroke's waist sending him forward, Batman responded by slamming his forearm into Deathstroke's throat.

As he watched him cough for air, Black Rose began her assault once again, using her fists striking quickly like a cobra, Batman blocked each punch with his hands, moving his backwards as she continued to strike, he quickly got the upper hand, when she struck again, he grabbed both of her hands and used his weight to toss her aside into the snow.

"Good evening Batman, I see you met my associates."

Batman turned his head sharply to one man coming out of the flames of the warehouse, a revolver in his hand, his white suit was complimented the snow, he would normally be an ordinary citizen, but his black skull mask set him apart from others.

"Black Mask." Bruce growled as he ran to strike

As he raised his fist, Black Rose quickly responded, sprinted in front of her employer, striking Batman in the stomach then in the face. He actually felt the strikes even though his armor was metal plated with a graphite, leather cowl.

"Now, while you're here, let me make one thing clear." Black Mask growled, his voice carrying a combination of street Italian, New Yorker and Boston "your so called crusade against me is flattering, but mark my words; people will die if you continue."

Batman smirked "You really think I'm scared of you? I have no one that you can harm Roman. I will not stop, so you just made you an enemy."

Black Mask smirked "Well then, Black Rose, kill him."

She nodded and flicked her wrists, a twin set of daggers slid from her wrists and into the palms of her hands. She quickly struck, Batman quickly retaliated by catching both weapons in his wrist gauntlets, as their faces met, he saw her brown eyes, they were glazed over, just the same as the waitresses at the Iceberg Lounge.

Moving with accurate precision, he let go of her knives and tossed a smoke bomb onto the ground, when the smoke cleared, Batman was gone, Deathstroke and Black Rose looked around.

"He's gone sir." Deathstroke said furiously "I had him! Next time keep your other assassins out of my way." He pointed at Black Rose and tossed his broken sword on the ground near Black Mask's feet

She rolled her eyes as Black Mask walked over to him "Your just like your father Joe, too idealistic and arrogant, you are not the only the assassin out on the prowl tonight."

Deathstroke shook his head in frustration and stormed off, the snow continued to fall over head. Black Rose soon followed as she walked off the other way.

"Please…help!"

Black Mask turned to Matthew crawling out of the burning building, his body was bloody and his body from the waist down was dead.

"Sir…help please!"

Roman looked over and walked over to Matthew "Did you do your duty son?"

"Yes sir…but Batman….he came back….took the flash drive from my pocket."

Black Mask looked at him "The one I told your men to retrieve?"

"Yes sir…"

Roman's gloved hands clenched into fists as he grabbed a singed two by four and slammed it into Matthew's head.

* * *

"Yes of course Mister Sionis, I will see to it at once."

Doctor Hugo Strange turned the cell phone he held in his hand off, scratched his beard and proceeded down the hall of Arkham Asylum, he had been an associate of Roman's for years and if his plans went into fruition, he would be more than just a doctor evaluating the insane criminals put away.

As he walked down the hall, his head turned to a cell with a few knives sitting on the bed, the cell door was open and the words RIP Prince of Comedy was written along the wall in blood, it was a shame what happened to Joker, but it had to be done.

His boots continued to carry him as he approached the cell he desired, he took his card key out of his pocket, slid it through the scanner, the red lights next to the handle changed to green as he opened the door.

Two men sat inside, one was older, his salt and pepper hair hung down to his ears, glasses were broken on the one side and his arms were held in a strait jacket.

The other man was sitting in the corner, holding an old photograph, evidence of this being the crease in the middle of the picture, his thinning dirty blonde hair hung at his shoulders.

"Doctor Crane, I hope you are well."

Scarecrow glared at him, the mask he wore years ago hung at his feet, he didn't say a word, only growl.

"Mister Tetch, I hope you are well this morning."

Jervis looked up "Oh yes, it won't be long until Alice is here correct?"

"Yes Mister Tetch, Alice will be here soon." Strange's voice was strong, deep and dignified "Mister Sionis has been in contact with me, it seems he is in need of your assistance once again."

"An….and what does Black Mask want me to do?" Jervis growled "You two took everything from me!"

"Because Batman has returned, I know you want his mask for yourself." Strange smiled "I will return your hats to you, all you need to do is report to Black Mask at his base in Crime alley."

"Yes sir!" Jervis smiled "Alice will be so happy!"

* * *

Damian kept to himself that night, too many scenarios were going through his mind as he thought about what happened tonight, he was almost killed and he felt scared, but something else caught his mind, Roman's female associate, the Black Rose.

Something about her seemed familiar, it was her brown eyes, they seemed familiar, like he had seen them before.

As the moon began to rise overhead, he pulled out his cell phone and leaned back, letting his back hit his pillows as the phone continued to ring.

"_Hello?"_

"Hi mom, it's Damian."

He couldn't see it, but Selina was smiling on the other side "_Damian, thought we'd never hear from you again." _

**Alright double header in a short amount of time. I absolutely love this story, and now we have two more characters, Doctor Strange and Mad Hatter, I promised myself Scarecrow would follow the Nolanverse tradition and make a cameo appearance, this won't be the only one to appear. **

**Some answers will be given in the next two part chapter.**


	8. Chapter 8: The Mad Hatter Part 1

The GCPD surrounded the building; the call came in at about midnight of female shrieks coming from lower Gotham.

Detectives Gordon and Bullock investigated the building as Akins stood with the other GCPD members.

"Canvas the houses; I want a statement from every neighbor on this block." He told a set of officers "I want a copy of the deed of this house from City Hall; I want to know who owned this building."

As Gordon and Bullock left the house's front steps, Akins glared at them in frustration.

"What's the situation gentlemen?"

"It's the same MO as the last three call Commissioner." Bullock grumbled "Three girls murdered, all wearing same clothing as the last three calls, youngest one was four years old."

Akins sighed as Gordon looked around, his eyes spotted something in the back alley "I'll be right back, think I saw something."

Bullock looked at Gordon "You need any help?"

"I can handle it." Gordon snapped

As he stepped into the alley, he calmed himself and walked into the shadows "You were at the last one too."

Batman stepped in front of Gordon "Your partner seems almost annoyed doing this job."

"Bullock's okay, bit crooked, but he's okay." Gordon replied

"What are the details of this one?"

Gordon sighed "Same as the last one, three girls all murdered, blonde haired, we found them in the same blue dress as before. Now it racks up to nine."

"At least whoever did this have a type." Batman looked out at Akins and Bullock

"It gets worse, this part only the GCPD knows, the women were brutally tortured, raped and murdered."

"Raped and murdered?"

"Throats were slit, and some of them we haven't even found."

"Do you have any leads?"

"No, but the situation seems the same as a few years ago, I'm going to look into it, but I do appreciate that your looking after Gotham."

As he turned to look at Batman again, he was gone out of sight.

"So that's what that feels like." Gordon shrugged

* * *

"Sounds like an old foe from my past." Blake sighed as he looked at the Bat computer "Personally, I hoped I'd never see him again."

"Who is he?" Damian leaned against a nearby table

Blake turned back to the computer and began to type on the computer; the screen above them came to life as a small man with thinning long brown hair, green hat and a green suit.

"His name is Jervis Tetch, a former neuroscientist working for WayneCorp, a subdivision of Wayne Enterprises developed by Derek Powers."

"Neuroscientist? He studied the nervous system?"

Blake nodded "Yes, he was one of the best, he developed a mind control chip that was originally designed to create the perfect soldier for the military, and they failed out however."

"Why?"

"The soldiers were dedicated to the cause and that's just it, they were too dedicated, some of them turned into suicide soldiers, others died while taking on impossible odds facing a hundred soldiers to one, the chips made them not human anymore. Ultimately he was laid off and during his time he went mentally insane, I faced him a few years ago, he tried brainwashing Barbara but I managed to take him down and sent him to Arkham."

Blake pressed a few more keys and the screen on the right displayed a few medical files "He was diagnosed as being insane and schizophrenic, seventeen women were kidnapped, seven of them were found raped and dead, while the other ten…" Blake felt himself release a breath "were never found."

"Why?"

"Tetch has many connections with the slave trade in Gotham, selling off the women to some third world country to be the warlord's sex toys seemed to be how he paid the bills, not to mention he is a known criminal now."

"How does he kidnap these women?" Damian folded his arms over his chest

Blake sighed and leaned back "I need to tell you the whole story first. About fifteen years ago, WayneCorp opened as a military project building, there are several divisions of the building, cryogenics which is run by Victor Fries, he's a good man, always brings donuts in on Tuesday and brings people over for football bar-b-q on Sundays, but he's obsessed with his work as of late. Then there's Robert Langstrom, he's a biologist who specializes in bats. Finally, there was Jervis, neurologist and developer of mind control chips."

"About ten years ago, when I was still Nightwing I tried to find the shipment after the project failed, the last shipment, after they failed they were smashed to pieces, the last box was coming in from Iraq and they were intercepted. I found Tetch, but not the shipment."

"Well it seems like they've been found." Damian growled "How many were in the box?"

"Five hundred, based on the nine that have gone missing these last few weeks, add onto the seventeen that were gone when I was around, we're down to a little over four hundred and seventy."

"I think I know someone who knows more about these projects."

* * *

It had been awhile since Damian had gone into work, he half expected Luke to be mad at him, but when he walked into the archives, a warm smile spread on the ex-boxer's features.

"Let me guess…more free soloing?"

Damian smirked "No, today is Orienteering."

"Is that like navigating?"

"Kind of." Damian pulled out a tablet "Do you know what these are?"

"Oh yeah, I remember these. Nasty little buggers." Luke Fox examined the tablet in his hand "Tetch was always a problem in the past, even at work, he had this obsession with his co-worker, it even went to the point she filed a sexual harassment suit against him."

"Who was his co-worker?" Damian asked

"Her name was Alice Church, nice girl, but she filed a report with the GCPD sixteen years ago about her fellow co-worker stalking her and being obsessed with her."

"That bad?"

"He had her picture in his office, the background on his phone and had her number on speed dial. Alice was kidnapped eight months later, a day before her wedding, someone found her a week later brutally attacked, raped and drugged."

"Do you have a picture of her?"

Fox nodded and pressed a couple of keys "After this ordeal, she and her husband moved to Alaska to live out their lives, I still get post cards from her every month."

A young girl appeared on the screen, blonde hair with bangs that hung down to her eye brows and blue eyes.

"Wait…" Damian looked at the screen "She looks just like…"

"All the young women who have been attacked? Yeah, they say Tetch has developed a type he enjoys, he claims Alice is reincarnated in every woman he's attacked, he doesn't even remember attacking them."

Damian frowned, so this was why Tetch was attacking women all the time, everything seemed to be explained "Anything you want to show me Fox?"

Fox smirked "Actually, I've got a few things in mind."

He led Damian from the computer to the main floor of the archives and opened up a brief case, inside was a long projectile like device.

"Line launcher capable of firing a steel cable from both ends, attaches one side to the other, the launcher acts like a guide and moves along the cable."

"How much weight can the rope support?"

"About three hundred and fifty pounds."

Damian smirked, this was going to be a fun gadget to use in combat, especially jumping down on enemies from a line they would have no idea where he was coming from.

Fox led him to another case, much smaller than the others, inside was what appeared to be a detonator "prototype gun jammer, when pressing the yellow button disables a gun within a length of five feet away."

Damian looked and held the jammer in his hand, it was lightweight and it had a belt clip on the back "How long does it take to recharge?"

"Usually about two minutes, it's a minute per discharge."

"I'll take them."

* * *

His phone rang as he walked out of WayneCorp; Damian checked the caller ID and smiled when he saw who it was.

"Hey good morning."

Damian couldn't see it but Tori was smiling on the other end "_Good morning yourself handsome, busy?"_

"Nah just left work."

"_I was thinking, if you weren't busy tonight, dinner and a movie at your place?"_

"Why not at your place?"

"_My place is still being unpacked, can't get around to finishing."_

"Sounds good to me." He smirked

* * *

The night soon descended and Damian paced the floor of his house for the fifth time, he knew eventually his feet would wear the floor down, but he was scared, this was the first time he went on a second date, his mom told him he was just like his father, a complete and utter playboy who charms women a lot.

There was something about her though, something about Victoria Queen that not only scared him but also intrigued him and attracted him to her, it scared him because of him hurting her with his secret identity of Batman but he knew being the daughter of Oliver Queen had its advantages.

The doorbell rang and Damian ran a hand through his locks and readjusted his black t-shirt, a trait he inherited from his mom was wearing black, he walked over to the door and opened it, Tori stood on the other side, dark green with a black stripes on the sleeves, blue jeans and her blonde hair was held back in a ponytail.

"Hey you." She pecked him on the cheek

Damian smiled, he still can't get over how beautiful she was, and even causally she was beautiful.

"Pizza showed up a while ago, been waiting." Damian smirked at her as she followed him into the living room

"Sorry, work took too long and I got caught up in traffic." Tori smirked as she lay on the couch

Damian brought the pizza in and sat down next to her, he felt weird, almost strange having a second date, he didn't know what to do, but for some reason he felt extremely happy with her around.

The movie they were watching was _Les Miserables _a French film Victoria had liked, one thing Damian noticed was that Tori looked a lot like Cosette, same hair color, skin tone, eye shape and eye color.

He looked over at Tori, who was silently wiping tears away from her eyes as the movie drew to a conclusion.

"Well, someone's a bit too sensitive." He smirked playfully at her

Tori glared at him playfully "Sh-shut up!"

Damian smirked "its okay Tori, I cried a bit at the end."

"Then where are your tears?"

"Oh I wiped them away by now." He said boldly

Tori slapped his chest "Sure you cried Mister Millionaire."

"It's billionaire Tori, millionaires are so last year."

"Teaser." She smirked at him

Damian did something drastic, something he never thought he would do, as they laughed at his joke, he leaned forward and kissed her fully on the lips, Victoria smiled, her eyes gave a look that said _what took you so long?_

Their bodies melted against each other, Damian truly felt at peace, everything seemed perfect, he had a home of his own in his city and a beautiful woman by his side, he felt like he could put Batman aside, even if it was just for one night.

* * *

Jervis Tetch stalked the alley ways of Gotham, it was a nightly prowl, and his pupils were dilated, his target was in sight, a blonde woman walked down the streets, her red trench coat slumped over her body.

He began to move, a needle in his hand, as he drew closer, his breath began to hitch, he could tell she wasn't alerted to his position, let alone of his existence.

He silently approached and tossed a small pebble from the nearby sidewalk, the blonde woman felt it and her purse slid off of her arms as she caught herself from tripping.

Tetch immediately ran over to her "Are you okay ma'am?"

"Yes I'm fine, thank you very much."

He smiled and began to slide some of her contents of her purse back inside "What is your name ma'am?"

"Elisa."

Tetch smiled wider, exposing his buck teeth and drew something from his pocket; he placed it on the back of her neck and pressed a button on his cufflink.

Elisa's blue eyes dilated as she stood where she was, Tetch smiled and slammed the needle into her arm, as the drugs began to take effect she collapsed onto the ground.

The Mad Hatter took her by the arms and dragged her into the alley way he just came from "Alice will be there soon my friends!"

**Well I hope everyone will enjoy this chapter, this was a major brain fart for me to write, sickness and work really have kept me down these last couple of days. Part two will be out this week I promise you all that. **


	9. Chapter 9: The Mad Hatter Part 2

The next morning wasn't as much of a struggle for Damian as he thought about last night, it was perfect, it wasn't just because of the sex, but it was just that he felt like he belonged somewhere, something he had felt for a long time, from last he can remember, it happened since he was told of his parent's history as Catwoman and Batman, he felt weird, almost like he didn't belong simply because of that fact.

But he has felt better for the last few months since he came to Gotham, working the streets as Batman he became his own father and as Damian Wayne, eccentric billionaire, he felt like his mother, high class rising up from the dirt and taking what he deserved.

He poured himself a cup of coffee and looked at the front page of the paper, nothing new aside from the Mad Hatter. His cell phone began to ring; he walked over to the counter and picked it up.

"Damian Wayne?"

"_Where the hell were you last night?" _

Damian tapped his fingers on the counter "I was busy last night Blake, I had a date."

"_The Mad Hatter struck again, Elisa Powers was taken over night."_

"Powers?" Damian's eyes went wide

"_Paxton's wife, he's furious, dedicating Wayne Enterprises finances to find Jervis and kill him."_

"I'll talk him down; he can't spend money in that company without consulting me."

"_No offense Damian, but I need you in the field, we need to find him before…"_

Heels clicked against the floor, Damian looked over at the stairs of his home "Blake, I'll have to call you back."

As he clicked the phone off, a figure approached the edge of the stairs "Zip me up?"

Damian smiled as Victoria pushed her blonde hair over her shoulder, her hair was held back in a messy bun but the rest of her blonde hair draped down her back with a slight curl. He walked over and gently zipped up the back of her black and silver colored dress. Her green eyes had a bit of make up around them and red lipstick covered her lips, the same shade his mother wore.

"You need to get this dressed up for work?"

"Not normally, you know my father's club in Starling City? Verdant?"

"Of course, how can I forget? We went there after high school graduation." Damian smirked

"He has gone to opening branches in the other cities and he wanted me to be the one to open Gotham's, and I have to report on it." She rolled her eyes

Damian pulled the zipper up to the base of her neck and gently ran his fingers along it which sent chills up Tori's spine as her fingers played with a lock of her hair. She turned to face him, their eyes met and for a moment his eyes almost gave away everything, his life in Italy, the desire he had for her, and his role as Batman.

Their lips silently met, her hands went from her hair to his shoulder blades and gently let them rest, Damian wrapped his arms around her waist; he truly felt happy having her in his arms.

As they parted, Tori grew a wide grin "Well, that was unexpected."

Damian smirked back at her "I aim to please."

He walked her to the door; she silently opened it, her overnight bag slung around her arm "Thank you." She stole a kiss "for the sex…and a perfect night."

Damian smiled "Your welcome."

He watched her head for her seventy-three navy blue Chevrolet Corvette and waved at her as she drove off. He let his head hit the door, as much as he had come to care about Tori, none of it would matter if he didn't stop the Mad Hatter and Black Mask.

* * *

"You're late."

"Sue me, had a late morning."

Blake sighed "Damian, I know about you and Victoria Queen."

"Really? How so?"

"Simple, where else would you be if you weren't in the suit?" Blake smirked "Look, its fine to have an outlet, but remember where your place is."

"I know where my place is, my place is between Black Mask and the city of Gotham, just because you had a fractured life does not mean I have to." Damian growled

John rose "You are just like your father."

"I'm not him." Damian growled as he walked over to the suit "Give me the information we have on the kidnappings."

"They're all blonde and blue eyed, the ages don't matter, now we count on eleven who have gone missing and fourteen of them are dead."

"It all originated with Alice Church, a co-worker he obsessed with and kidnapped her." Damian replied

"Your well informed boy." Blake looked at the computer "Deal with Paxton before you handle Mad Hatter, I'll tap into some local networks, see what I can do."

* * *

"Wayne Enterprises will be funding the GCPD's support with finding my wife and making sure she comes home along with bringing down this sociopath who harmed all the other families in Gotham!" Paxton declared

News reporters flashed their cameras and held their microphones as Paxton spoke out to them and citizens of Gotham who were listening to the CEO of Wayne Enterprises.

"We need to clean up this city! We need to bring it back to the way it used to be, we need peace!"

As Paxton continued to speak, Damian rode up to the side of the press conference in his black MV Augusta, he removed his helmet, leaving him in a black t-shirt, black with red trimmed bike jacket, blue jeans and black shoes. He quickly walked over to the podium only to be stopped by a pair of security men in black suits.

"Hold it sir, no one is allowed up…"

Damian held up his driver's license "I'm Damian Wayne, let me through."

He moved past the guards and approached Paxton "Mister Powers, step down."

"Mister Wayne, care to speak?" Paxton asked

"I don't think it's my place, _you _are the CEO of the company, and I'm nothing more than an employee." Damian smirked; he knew he would put Paxton in his place

"Oh I insist Mister Wayne." Paxton whispered through gritted teeth

"Oh _I_ insist Mister Powers." Damian folded his arms over his chest

The reporters looked at the pair of men "Mister Powers, why is it Mister Wayne will not speak before us?"

Paxton looked at them "I don't know."

"Well he does have a board position at the company correct?"

Damian looked at him and Paxton rubbed the back of his neck "Uh uh…."

The young Wayne approached the podium "I don't, but I speak in my father's voice, Bruce Wayne's voice when I say this city will persevere, and Wayne Enterprises will donate a large sum of fifteen million dollars to the families of the victims through the Wayne Foundation."

As the reporters began to flash pictures, everyone was cheering in praise of Damian; he smiled and looked back at Paxton, his scowl made Damian realize he had just made an enemy, and he was okay with that.

Body guards began to block the reporters from moving as Damian left the stage and walked back to his motorcycle, his phone began to ring as he began to get his helmet over his head, he tapped the side of his helmet; luckily it was connected to blue tooth.

"Wayne."

"_The GCPD thinks they found Jervis, he's locked up in a warehouse in the docks where they intend to make the trade off."_

"Who's the buyer?"

"_Third world dictator Generalissimo Lee, he's done business with Tetch before."_

"Send me the coordinates and alert Akins to Lee's arrival, Blake…this is getting bad."

"_I know it is, but we'll handle it."_

"Do you think Deathstroke will be there?" Damian drove out onto the road "Or the Black Rose?"

"_I don't know. We'll just have to see."_

* * *

The night soon descended, Mad Hatter was getting impatient, things were getting tense, he barely managed to escape the GCPD, Strange was supposed to be giving him full immunity from the law. He knew Batman was around as well, but didn't know if he should be a threat, but the thought of possessing his cowl made a twinge spring in his throat.

"The last shipment is getting ready for loading boss!"

Hatter looked down at the person who spoke; he was one of two identical cousins they were Tweedledee and Tweedledum, two of his associates from the old days, they were still stocky and still extremely heavy set, but they would do.

"Good, get it going, Alice will be pleased!" Hatter chuckled

As the cousins walked off with a large crate carrying one side in each hand, the Black Rose approached him.

"You really have been doing well Jervis."

He looked up at Black Rose with a grin and jumped up on a set of crates so they were eye level "Why couldn't I ever be able to put a chip on you." He reached a hand to her mask

She quickly slapped his hand away and threatened to punch him "Don't touch me again."

The lights went out with a flash; she smirked behind her mask as the Mad Hatter began to twitch in sheer shock "Look around! Find him! He will mess everything up for Alice's arrival!"

Black Rose could only roll her eyes as the Hatter began to run around the upper platform, the lower held Black Mask's mercenaries, each carrying an assault rifle scouring the room.

With a pop, something broke through the bay window on the front entrance way and slam into the wall between Black Rose and Mad Hatter. Something was heading toward them; Rose ran her fingers along what carried the impact shot.

"It's wire."

From the other side, something large burst through the window, as Tetch walked toward the rope, the figure glared and slammed into the wall immediately grabbing him by the throat and tossing him roughly along the floor, his body did a series of rolls, his green hat dropping on the floor as his back slammed into the wall.

"Batman!"

Batman began his approach toward Jervis, it was time to end this, he didn't expect a kick into his back and cape, as he turned, Black Rose smiled and drew her bow and arrow taking aim at him, with quick precision the arrow soared, it felt like déjà vu as he caught the arrow and tossed it aside.

He was soon moving toward Rose, as she began to attack with her bow, he blocked the attack with his arm.

"Get out of my way." He growled

"Don't think so handsome." Black Rose smirked at him from behind her mask

"I said move." He used his weight and managed to get her down to the ground

He soon moved back to Tetch who was hurdled over in the corner, Batman moved quickly and grabbed the small man by his collar "Where's Elisa Powers?"

"I…I…" Tetch stuttered

"Where!?" He yelled

"In the back! Alice was perfect!"

"I'm afraid not anymore." Batman slammed a fist into the side of Jervis' head, sending him to the ground

As Tetch landed on the wood, Batman went back to Black Rose, when sirens and helicopter lights began to shine inside the building.

He readjusted his radio and managed to pick up the signal from outside "_Alert, prisoner 4564231 is inside the warehouse, I repeat Mad Hatter is in the warehouse!" _

Batman sighed and looked down at Black Rose "Get up!"

She looked up at him "I don't take orders from you Batman."

The door broke down and the mercenaries on the bottom were quickly put down by new figures in pure black, cloths over their mouths, sunglasses over their eyes and military style hats sat on their heads. As they scanned the room, they spotted the pair.

"Alert, Batman and Black Rose are also in here. Orders sir?"

There was a pause as the men began to creep into the building; Batman looked at her "Truce for now?"

"Truce." She nodded

"Understood. All arms take them down now!"

As the bullets began to fire into their position, Batman ducked down with Black Rose.

"I'll create a distraction," She primed one of the arrows "You take them down."

"There's at least a hundred men down there, I can't take them all down myself."

"Fine, we do it together then." She jumped up and fired her arrow

As the bullets began to fire again, the arrow shot down as Batman drew his gun jammer, aimed and triggered it, taking down the two remaining men the arrow didn't stun, he grabbed the line launcher and shot it back the way he came in.

"Hang on." He grabbed her waist

She wrapped her arms around his neck as the line launcher moved through the building's window, as they got outside, he triggered a button, which slowed down the launcher, he looked over and hit the secondary shot.

Bullets flew over them as they moved toward one of the buildings away from the scene.

* * *

As they landed on the roof, the duo dropped to the ground, Batman panted hard and looked over at Black Rose, who stood but gripped her side in pain, he looked over at her and saw blood leaking from her uniform.

"Hang on." He began to find something on his belt

Black Rose sighed and tore some of her coat off and wrapped it around her side "I'll be fine. Thanks for the help but I could have handled it."

As she looked up, Batman was gone; she sighed and began to mend her wound.

* * *

Akins walked up to the roof of the GCPD, his pistol pointed out; his eyes scanned the area, frowning slightly as he couldn't find anything.

"Quite a sneaky move you pulled Akins."

He quickly turned to Batman standing in front of him, cape draped over his arms, exposing only his chest and up.

"I have no idea what you mean."

"Swat members killing Roman Sionis' men and attempting to kill me."

"No SWAT members were called out to Mad Hatter's location." Akins looked at him "Let me reassure you of that."

"Then who were they?"

"I don't know, but knowing you, you're going to find out."

He looked at Akins "You seem concerned."

"Someone or something is corrupting my department, Batman, and I don't know where to even start." Akins looked at Batman

"Start at the bottom, someone wants to keep an eye on you. A storm will be coming." Batman glared at Akins

* * *

The Black Rose closed the door behind her and sighed as she sat down, her wound was closed, as she removed the outer uniform, exposing her blonde hair to the air conditioning coming from her apartment, she looked at the wound, it was closed, as she began to remove the bandaging, blood stained the skin below it.

She grabbed a set of black thread and gently ran it through the wound until it closed and covered it with a new bandage, her body was covered with a black top and removed her mask.

"Well, Batman wants a war." Victoria Queen looked at herself in the mirror "He's got a war."

**Well, big secrets have been exposed! Short amount of Author's note aside from don't expect a new chapter up for awhile, work's picking up this week sadly, so don't worry, I'll get it up when I can! And expect some familiar Justice League characters appearing!**


	10. Chapter 10: The plot thickens

Quincy Sharp walked up the stairs of Wayne Enterprises, security walked behind him and his assistant Doctor Hugo Strange walked beside him on the right, he ran a head along his bald head and readjusted his glasses as they approached the front desk.

"Good morning Mister Sharp." Lucy smiled "Mister Powers is awaiting you, but he's in conference right now."

"With whom?" Strange asked

"Mister Wayne, he stormed in a few minutes ago." She leaned back, her face was flushed

"Thank you ma'am," Sharp looked at his men "Stay here, Doctor Strange, come with me."

Both men walked into the board room where Paxton had a furious look on his face, Damian stood on the other side, his arms folded across his chest.

"You really wouldn't support my decision Paxton? You realize how many reporters I had to speak to so your little episode last week didn't ruin your career?"

"Since you got here all you've done is stir the pot." He slammed his hands on the table "I was running this company fine since you were in diapers."

The young Wayne chuckled "No, you've driven this company right into the ground, experimental WayneCorp tech that brainwashes women, including your wife? Letting people like Black Mask run around? Planning on giving money to the police to have someone murdered? You realize the companies name would be tarnished if you even tried pulling that crap?"

"I should have you removed from the…"

"Go on ahead." Damian challenged "I guarantee you that if you throw me out of Gotham; you'll be run out of town and become an outcast."

Sharp cleared his throat in protest, both men looked over and Paxton immediately straightened himself.

"Oh Mister Sharp, I wasn't expecting you until two."

"Well my previous meeting ended early, so I stopped for lunch at Joe's and I stopped here."

Damian looked over "Joe's is a good place; try their cheddar cheese fries, to die for."

"I would," Sharp smiled "but my heartburn would pick up past what my medication would do."

Paxton sighed "Warden Quincy Sharp, Damian Wayne the…"

"I know who Mister Wayne is; I had a lot of respect for his father." Both Damian and Sharp shook hands "it is such a shame when he died."

"Thank you sir." Damian smiled

"Well, since you're here, I can talk to you both." Sharp repositioned himself as Strange handed both men a folder "I plan on making a project when I'm mayor called Project: Arkham City, block off the narrows and allow the criminals to take control while we the members of the upper class society stay in the good parts of Gotham."

Paxton looked at the folder with interest as Damian slammed it closed which made Strange look at him "And what of the people of the Narrows Mister Sharp? Innocent people who have nothing to do with the criminals."

"There are nothing but criminals in the Narrows Mister Wayne…."

"My mother lived in Old Town, which is a district in the Narrows Mister Sharp, she is a terrific woman, and no one we met have said anything but nice things to say about her." Damian protested, a scowl forming on his face "So why are you showing us this?"

"I want your endorsement for my candidacy and my project. It will happen as soon as I'm elected."

"Well, you have the companies…" Paxton began to say

"You don't have our support." Damian protested "Both mine or the companies, it's in my family's name and I will not allow my company to support such a cannibalistic thing. You're talking about rapists and mass murders from Black Gate wandering around attacking innocent people who have done nothing at all to them."

"There aren't just…"

"You're talking about letting people like Crane wander the streets injecting people with fear toxin! Or how about if he were still living, having the Joker cause massive terrorist attacks within the city limits? I'm sorry. Neither myself nor my company will support this plan Mister Sharp."

Sharp glared at Damian and simply shook his bald head "You're making a big mistake Mister Wayne, but that's your decision to make."

He took his leave from the room, his body guards followed soon after by Strange, Damian glared as the pair's eyes met, and Strange's gray eyes met his greenish blue as Strange spoke up.

"We will hope you will change your ways Mister Wayne." Strange said smoothly "Every person has their secrets, and we will find yours."

With that he left, leaving only Paxton and Damian in the room.

"You realize you made a huge mistake right?" Paxton glared "You just pissed off one of the most…"

"He's a low level warden at Arkham with a former drug record." Damian looked at Paxton, his body relaxing as his hands went into his pockets "He would have used Wayne Enterprises and Wayne Corp money to block half the city off so he can keep his inmates in a bigger cell. I don't know about you, but I wouldn't allow it, and neither would my father if he were alive."

Damian stormed out of Paxton's office, slamming the door behind him; Paxton could only sigh as he picked up his cell phone and began to call a number.

"Its Powers, Wayne is getting too involved." Paxton sighed

He couldn't see it, but on the other end of the line, Roman Sionis was smiling under his mask "_Very well, we'll deal with him."_

* * *

Damian opened the door to Wayne Manor, his eyes scanned over the room, white sheets were draped over the bigger items, and he sighed as he looked around, his sneakers against the hard floor as he looked around, he wasn't aiming for the Batcave, but he was attempting to understand who his father was.

His travels took him to what he believed to be the master bedroom, as he felt himself walk, he was drawn to a small table, as he lifted the sheet, his eyes found themselves attached to the many pictures, one was of a small boy, and he assumed to be his parents beside him, the other was of a brunette woman in red.

As he picked up the picture of the boy and his parents, he knew it wasn't him, Damian's family pictures were on the mantle back home in Florence.

"That's your dad and his parents."

His head rotated to Blake approaching him. Damian's eyes returned to the table where a small stethoscope laying in a box, it was severely burnt but restored.

"That belonged to your father; I'm surprised he didn't take it with him when he left." Blake stood next to Damian

"This is why he fought?" He set the picture back down and ran his fingers along the stethoscope, feeling the burns crack under his fingers "For people who ended up leaving him?"

"Yeah, that's the sacrifice of being Batman; you lose people," he looked down at the brunette "though from what your dad told me, some people hurt him because of him being Batman, he just couldn't let it go."

"But he did, for eight years he did."

"That's true, he did let it go, but it almost killed him because he let it go." Blake looked at him "Look, there will come a day when people will hurt you because of this, your parent's will always be at your side because they went through what you're going through."

"Is that what happened between you and Barbara?" He looked at Blake "You couldn't let it go? And you almost lost her?"

"No." Blake sighed "It was because of my work she is like how she is, crippled. She almost lost her life because I was so focused on a job."

"When will you tell me what this job is?"

"Hopefully, I never will, but if it comes up, ask Barbara, she'll tell you more than I could."

Damian leaned against the wall "Can I show you something?"

* * *

"It's called Arkham City, according to Sharp, he plans on blocking off the Narrows from the rest of Gotham, letting the criminals kill each other in one big prison."

They had moved to Damian's house in upper Gotham, he needed Blake's opinion on Sharp's plan. Rain came down hard on the windows with an occasional rumble of thunder. Damian had the blue prints of Sharp's project on his laptop.

"Sharp is an idiot, no way he could come up with something as elaborate as this, someone is helping him." Blake scratched his chin

"I think I know." Damian typed a few keys on his computer and Strange's picture came up "Doctor Hugo Strange. Psychiatrist at Arkham, he spends his career studying the supernatural criminals that are in there, Scarecrow, Mad Hatter. More than likely Black Mask."

"I still have some contacts in the Narrows. See what they can dig up on…"

Before Blake could finish, the lights went dead, Damian sighed "God damn it."

A sound rang past their heads and slammed into the wall beside Blake, who pulled out his cell phone and turned on the flash light.

As Damian got closer, his eyes managed to scan over what the object was as he pulled it out of the wall, a green arrow.

"What the hell?" Damian twirled it between his fingers, letting it arch into the air

"Doesn't look like Black Rose's, maybe another arrow user in Gotham?"

"Well you tell me Blake. You're the senior level crime fighting vigilante here."

The window on the far side of the room broke as another figure joined the pair, they couldn't see who it was, but when the power came back on, Damian's eyes narrowed.

The figure was hooded, black cloth like armor covered his body with green gloves, a quiver around his shoulder and a dark green compound bow was holding a green arrow right at Damian.

"Damian Wayne." The figure spoke in an extremely deep voice "You have failed this city."

**A short chapter I know, but chapter 11 will be much longer with plenty of flashbacks and we will finally get some answers leading to the end of the Black Mask ark and lead to the main villain. So flashbacks coming up in eleven and I promise I will try to get it up as fast as I can.**


	11. Chapter 11: The truth comes out

"Damian Wayne, you have failed this city." The metallic voice spoke

Damian smirked as the hooded figure had an arrow poised at his head, he knew exactly who this was, now it was time to expose him.

He cleared his throat "Io so chi sei, non so perché il tuo qui, ma il vostro tempo è venuto Oliver Queen. (I know who you are, I don't know why your here, but your time has come Oliver Queen.)" Damian's eyes narrowed when he said who it was

Blake looked at the hooded figure, who smiled under his hood; a hand went to his belt and pressed a silver button.

Damian's feet began to move to behind his desk as he looked at Blake "Secure the building, make sure no one else came in, knowing Mister Queen, he didn't come alone."

Blake nodded and walked out as quickly as his older legs would take him, the Hood narrowed his eyes and fired his arrow; Damian quickly responded by throwing his arm through the air, a metallic object slammed into the arrow.

The Hood looked down at a silver throwing star on the ground; he looked up to Damian who took what appeared to be a thin katana sword.

"This sword once belonged to Ra's Al Ghul, though for the life of me I can't understand people called him Ras back in my father's day." Damian pulled the sword out of it's sheathe "my dad had shattered it but restored it; I took it with me when I left. So, let's see if those old bones can keep up with my dad's successor."

Both men immediately went into the offense, their strikes precise and quick, bow matching with sword, Damian could only smile when their weapons collided, he then went on the power play tactic and broke their struggle, slamming his foot into Green Arrow's chest.

* * *

John limped down the stairs to the main door, he knew it would happen eventually, that the Green Arrow would show up, but he didn't expect it to happen so soon.

A click of a shotgun caught his ear as he approached the door.

"Don't move." The voice whispered

"Well well," Blake turned his head "It's about time you got here, come on, we gotta stop them before this whole house gets torn apart."

* * *

The rain came in through the broken window as the two men continued their fight, Damian's sword strikes were precise as they met Green Arrow's bow but the Hood got the upper hand and knocked the sword from Damian's hand, took aim and fired an arrow right at the young Wayne's head.

Damian's hand went up and he caught the arrow "Did you really think I wouldn't learn a trick or two in my training on how to fight every person in the world?"

The Hood glared and drew two arrows and fired them, Damian smiled as he caught them both with both of his hands and tossed them to the ground. Next came three, they soared through the air as Damian caught two with his hands and stopped one with his foot.

"Oliver, stop this now."

Oliver didn't turn "I can handle this, he knows what happened to her and he's going to tell me."

"He won't tell you because he doesn't know Ollie." The voice said again

Oliver was preparing four arrows when a hand rested on his "Stop this please."

The owner was a woman a year younger than Oliver with shoulder length brownish blonde hair that had a slight curl in it, green eyes and slightly tanned skin with a black corset under a black leather jacket, fishnet stockings and knee length boots.

"Laurel, if I don't, he'll never tell us…"

"What happened to whom?" Damian asked

"Our daughter." Laurel looked up at him "Victoria."

"I thought so, listen, why don't we talk in the Batcave? It's just up the street."

Blake stood in the doorway and escorted Laurel out and called for Barbara to meet them. As Oliver began to move, Damian stood in place.

"Oh, and Oliver?"

Oliver's head turned to Damian free running, letting his foot glaze against the side of his desk as he slammed a fist into Oliver's cheek.

"That's for my busted window."

* * *

"It all started six months ago, Victoria disappeared and we didn't know where she was, next thing we know, we're getting reports of you being back in Gotham, we figured you would know where she was."

They had moved to the Batcave, Barbara sat in her wheelchair while Oliver sat beside Laurel while Blake stood near Barbara and Damian stood in the corner.

"No, I had never known she left Starling City, I only knew that she had a job working with the Gotham Gazette."

Oliver sighed; he looked the same as he did when he was twenty-eight years old, only graying and a few creases.

"For you guys to understand what happened, I need to back track a few years." He sighed and leaned back "When Tori was born…I had gotten into an accident, I was struck in the chest and got a pace maker installed, I knew I would need to find a successor, I thought of Arsenal, but Roy is a loose cannon, loyal, but reckless. So I began to train her how to use a bow at the age of ten, by fourteen, Laurel here," He motioned to his wife with his head "trained her on using her intelligence and looks to get the job done while she isn't in cover."

Damian thought for a moment "Wait, so I was the victim of Black Canary's training!?"

Laurel shook her head "Damian, if there is one person Victoria could be honest with, it's you."

"Like my father before me, I found a list of names, men who were corrupting not only my city, but my allies, one of them was a man named Rhino."

His eyebrows rose "Rhino is one of Black Mask's associates; he claimed the False Facers were being recruited from all over."

"She tracked him to Gotham six months ago, when it happened….I lost contact with her, all I know is that Victoria was captured by Black Mask."

"Wait." Damian walked over to his costume and it slowly rose, he removed his glove and walked over to Barbara "Can you run the blood on this and see whose it is; also, check to see how many of those chips Hatter used were missing as of the last shipment theft."

"You got it." Barbara smiled and turned back to the computer

He thought of everything that had happened these last few months, let alone his own family, his mother and father, and his baby sister Maria. He just wondered how much his father thought of his work, let alone if he even knew.

Damian walked away, toward the catwalk leading to the elevator, he felt horrible, his heart was pounding, he had a grim feeling he knew whose blood it was, but he would never admit it.

"She really cared about you when you were in Starling City."

He looked to his side as Laurel approached "When you two graduated, she couldn't stop talking about you and she was so depressed when you went back to Italy."

"I was depressed too." Damian smiled

Laurel smirked "I told her to move on, that you would find her if you really care about her and it seems like you really do." She leaned in close "And I don't know about Oliver, but I approve of you two."

Damian smiled as Barbara spoke up "Damian! Got something for you!"

He ran over to the computer as it finished its scan, she pressed a key and rolled back, Damian looked at the screen and felt the tears build as Victoria's picture appeared on the screen.

"There was one chip missing. Best I can tell, she might have become the first victim of Mad Hatter."

Damian didn't say a word; he walked past them with his glove in hand.

"Damian?" Blake asked

"Hey, where are you going?" Oliver demanded

He didn't say a word; he just grabbed pieces of his costume and began to assemble them on his body.

* * *

The cold air washed against his skin, Damian stood on the highest tower overlooking Gotham, which came from the Old Wayne Tower. He couldn't understand any of it, he just needed to be alone, and maybe if it were better if he was alone, without feeling this way, feeling human, maybe if he was just himself as Batman, he wouldn't have to feel pain.

Something wet hit his cowl; he didn't know what it was until he put a gloved hand to his face that was when he realized he had been crying. Crying over someone he had met a few months ago, he had two dates with and had pretty much been lied to the entire time they had been together.

Damian let the tears stream down his face as he looked out at Gotham, determined even more than ever to free his city and the woman he cared about from Black Mask.

**Okay, so Green Arrow/The Hood and Black Canary are in Gotham. They will remain in the story until Black Mask is defeated, which will be in about three chapters from now. I'm setting it up so there's going to be an introduction to the end plot for Roman, a preparation chapter and then the major battle that will ensure.**

**These are the Stephen Amell and Katie Cassidy versions of Arrow and Canary for those who are wondering and for the end bit here, I took what some were reviewing when they said how Damian would react, well, this was only part one of how he reacted. Part two will be coming up in the next three chapters.**

**So now I won't update for a bit, but don't worry, it'll get really good soon!**


	12. Chapter 12: The new face in town

John Blake watched his apprentice on the top of the old Wayne Tower via the security feeds from a satellite, he felt bad, he could relate, there was a time when he was Nightwing that things just seemed hopeless and he didn't feel like he could love anything aside from his duel life.

"John, I think you should talk to him."

Blake shook his head at his wife "Barbara, I'm not going to talk to him. He made this mistake and he needs to be the one to correct it. I'm not going to hold his hand and tell him it's going to be okay." He shook his head and turned his back on his wife

_No one did that for me._

"I still think you should, at the very least, he deserves to know something." Barbara pleaded with her husband

"No means no." Blake shot back sternly

Barbara straightened herself up "Then if you won't tell him what happened to Batgirl and Robin. Then I'll tell him myself."

"You really would…"

"He deserves it; you haven't been exactly honest with him about all of this, everything you did. If Bruce and Selina could tell him everything about their lives…"

"He's their son; he's not my child….he's not Tim."

"No one can be Tim Drake John and you know that." Barbara replied sternly, her hands placed in her lap "He doesn't know what happened to him or me….how we ended up this way, why you need a cane."

"I'm sure Bruce knows…."

"I don't think so; Damian seems pretty out of it when it comes to….oh what did we call it…? The killing joke." Barbara glared at Blake again

"Barbara," he rubbed his temples in annoyance "please don't go there."

"I'm sure Damian would love to know what happened to Joker, why he's not locked up in the asylum."

"Barbara, I swear to god…" Blake started but was soon interrupted by the communications link that opened up "What's wrong Damian?"

"_I need to pay a visit to the Asylum; I need some answers only one of the inmates can give."_

"Fine, Barbara wants you to come down to the GCPD to talk about a private matter." Blake rolled his eyes

"_Fine, I'll stop by after lunch tomorrow."_

* * *

Arkham Asylum had been moved from its old location in the Narrows sometime after Bane's break in, it now was an abandoned building but the new location was connected by a small bridge on an island in the Gotham Bay.

As Damian drove his rolls up the road of the bridge, he was stopped by a man in all black that looked like the mercenary he fought with Black Rose when he was taking on Mad Hatter a few months back.

"Identification please and reason for visit." The soldier spoke

Damian held up his driver's license "Damian Wayne, I'm here to see Jervis Tetch for former employment questions regarding WayneCorp."

"Of course sir, please proceed through, entrance one."

Damian nodded and rolled up his window and drove forward down the main path heading for the Intensive Treatment Facility, his eyes saw what he could of the island, what little there was viewable was only the front entrance.

"Oracle, what can you tell me of the Asylum? What other facilities are there?"

"_Plenty, the island was originally the home of the founder of the Asylum Amadeus; it has a garden, medical facility, a medical facility, a penitentiary and an old mansion that was once the home of the founder." _Barbara spoke through the communicator

Damian nodded "Alright thanks, is Queen in place?"

"_He's waiting for the signal." _

"Good, wait until I get in, my face needs to be seen before we put into motion what we have planned." He parked the car and immediately got out

* * *

"Ah, welcome Mister Wayne, I do hope your ride here was easy enough." Hugo Strange smiled at Damian as the pair of men shook hands

"Wasn't hard to find, it's an island in the middle of the bay." Damian nodded as Strange led Damian down the halls

"As you can see, the Asylum has expanded over the past few years; we now have more room for criminals, though these are not the major criminals that have plagued Gotham."

"Kind of like Bane and Joker?"

"Exactly." Strange sneered

As the pair of men walked down the hall, Damian noticed a cell that said RIP with various clown symbols along the walls of the cell.

"Mister Tetch is right down the hall, I am surprised someone from Enterprises would want to ask him employment questions."

"We just want to make sure things he did with the chips won't come back to bite us later on."

Strange nodded, as he turned his head back, the lights went out with a thump, Strange looked up and sighed.

"Emergency generators online now." Strange spoke into the walkie on his belt

There was no response on the other end, something that caused Strange to hit his walkie again.

"Control room…respond now."

Damian stepped into the darkness and drew something from his belt, with quick precision, he struck Strange in the neck, and the taser he used knocked Strange out along with a smack to the head.

He slipped a ski mask over his face and walked down the hall until he found Tetch's cell, he slammed the door with his foot and it hit the wall with a thud.

Tetch looked up at him "Who…who…"

"Who do you think Tetch?" He sneered with the best Batman's voice he could

"Batman!" Tetch flew into a corner

Damian walked over and grabbed Tetch by the neck, slamming him into the wall "Tell me, Black Mask captured someone six months ago, a young woman, did you use one of your chips on her?"

Tetch's body twitched "Si….please….I…."

Damian threw Jervis to the floor and slammed his foot on his arm "Tell me!"

"Yes! Yes! I did!"

"Why?"

"She…she was going to kill Roman, I had to save him! He was the only one who saved me from this hell!" Tetch cried

Damian frowned "How do I remove it? Surely it must be different."

"It is! Only an electrical burst can disable it long enough to remove the chip from Miss Queen's neck."

"Thank you." Damian slammed a fist into Tetch's face, knocking him out

He slipped out of the cell and walked down the hall, the door opened and Oliver stood and nodded as the power turned back on.

The pair ran to Damian's car and the engine started just as the mercenary security ran to the door as they drove.

* * *

The night soon descended and Batman stood on the roof of the major crimes unit of the GCPD, with the Bat-signal lit in the sky.

Detective Gordon walked up the stairs and closed the door "Thanks for meeting me so soon."

Batman nodded and didn't say a word as his cape surrounded his lower body, his eyes focused on Gordon.

"I have a list of names, these men are…I believe they are corrupted cops who are reporting to Black Mask, I have tracked their emails and phone records and they take back to Black Mask's thugs. One of which, Rhino, you brought him in with a human smuggling case a few months ago…he got released from Blackgate a few days ago."

Batman took the list from Gordon and didn't let his face leave Gordon. "Do you think you can do something about it?"

"I'll see what I can do."

Gordon turned his back to the signal and flipped the signal off "Change is coming to Gotham again, seems almost funny when you think about it. That's what you fought for right?"

He turned to Batman begin gone again "God damn, I hate when he does that."

* * *

The six police officers stood around in a corner of Gotham's lower side, they were waiting for something, and Batman couldn't figure out what it was.

He sat in the Raptor with the camouflage unit turned on and just watched them; he needed to know what was going on and why GCPD members were working with Black Mask.

A black van pulled up and Black Mask descended from within, followed by two of his associates from the False Facers, one he recognized as Rhino, the other he didn't know. Batman turned on the speaker and allowed the audio from outside to come in through the speakers.

"How much longer until we gotta stop with the uniforms?" One of the cops asked

Black Mask walked out onto the snow "It won't be much longer my friends, all we need to do is just wait. But, I'm afraid you will not be a part of it."

Rhino and the other associate approached the six cops and pulled out a gun, immediately opening fire, though instead of bullets, they shot out tiny needles that landed in the necks of the men.

"They're laced with poison, you lot will be dead in a few minutes." Black Mask pulled out a piece of paper and let it fly in the wind as the bodies dropped one by one

As they pulled back into their car and drove off, Batman immediately gave chase, keeping on them like fly on wax.

* * *

The van drove toward crime alley, Batman couldn't understand what was in there for them, but keeping pursuit was the most he ever used this car since Fox gave it to him.

As they drove down the street, a series of men stood blocking them with what appeared to be heavy submachine guns. As the black van drove into a side, Batman kept back, turning on the cloaking and flipping on the audio.

"What is the big deal here?" Rhino bellowed as the men climbed out

The leading man, black hair, a thin goatee around his lips and a black business suit approached "I will only speak with Roman Sionis." His Italian accent was thick

Batman's eyes went wide as Black Rose stepped outside beside her boss; Roman kept his mask on his face.

"Well, well, I thought I drove you out of town years ago Alberto."

Alberto smirked "You know me Roman; I am here to claim what is mine."

"The Falcone crime family belongs to me now, and you know that." Black Mask smirked under his mask

"Well now, I'm giving you by sunrise tomorrow morning to pack up and leave, these men you see here are just a small amount of the force I have gathering, if you don't leave Gotham, I will kill you all."

Batman frowned and drove off toward the Batcave, he needed to end this or at least slow it down.

* * *

Damian sat down in his house, he had returned the cape and cowl back into the cave and just needed some time to think. He checked his phone and there was no sign from Victoria at all.

His phone went off and Damian picked it up "Damian Wayne?"

"_Since when do you have to be this formal with me?" _

He smiled "Sorry Tori, it's just what I normally do when I pick up the phone."

"_It's okay. Listen, I'm going to be busy for the next couple of days, work has picked up."_

"Tori," Damian stopped her for a minute "I uh…met your parents. Oliver and Laurel are in Gotham."

"_Did they say why?" _She sounded a bit annoyed

"They uh…came because they were worried about you." Damian sighed "They think something happened when they had you go after Roman."

The line went dead, Damian sighed and almost felt like crying his theories were proven right.

He clicked his phone again "Blake, we have a problem. The Falcone's are back."

* * *

Michael Akins sat at his desk in the GCPD as the door was being knocked on "Come in!" He called

Detective Bullock stepped inside "Sir, six of our officers are dead in Crime Alley, Black Mask and what appeared to be Alberto Falcone were seen as well, this was found near the bodies."

Akins took the piece of paper and growled, crumbling it in his hands with a look of fury and anger.

"Sir?"

"Get the SWAT team together, Batman must die, along with Falcone and Black Mask. Tomorrow, we end this."

**Okay, so chapter 12 is up! This one I had major writer's block to write, I have thirteen done already, so that'll be up extremely soon, fourteen will take awhile due to it hopefully being the biggest and best fight scene I've ever written, so expect that by the fourth of July!**


	13. Chapter 13: One Day More

Blake stormed into the Batcave "Now is our chance Damian, if we just let Black Mask and Falcone kill each other, you sweep in and bring Roman down."

Damian looked out at The Bat, his mind wandered as he thought of Victoria again, picturing her as a brainwashed killer, killing innocent people for Roman, those who would dare oppose him, it felt like too much to handle, he had a duty as Batman to take down those who are corrupt and bring about justice, but where does the line between good and bad go gray?

"Now, we'll have to test the suit to see if it can handle the amount of rounds from…" Blake looked up from the computer to see Damian heading for the elevator "Where are you going?"

"Out, I'll be back." He didn't face his mentor; he pressed the button on the elevator and climbed up

* * *

His mind continued to wander as he eventually found himself away from the Palacades and toward the Gotham Bay, his feet stopped in the middle of the busy walking bridge, people were walking with their dogs or others, jogging with ear buds in their ears or riding bikes, he looked out at the ocean and the setting sun.

Damian never thought Victoria would affect him this much, one woman made his confidence shake like this, to the point he felt sick in his stomach knowing tomorrow morning things would change and God only knows how much it would change, he didn't know if he had to start over again with Falcone or would Gotham be free from Black Mask's grip? But what would he loose?

Deathstroke would be finished, that was a benefit. Black Mask and his associates left would face time in Arkham, but would he loose Victoria?

His mind replayed their date, the second date they had that later led to some serious one on one special attention in his bedroom until one in the morning. His lips slowly pressed together as he felt himself begin to sing a lyric from the movie they watched.

"_Tomorrow you'll be worlds away…and yet with your my world has started." _Damian muttered to himself as he leaned his arms against the railing overlooking the bay "_Will we ever meet again? I was born to be with you. And I swear I will be true."_

* * *

Victoria applied the black eye makeup to her eyes and slipped the plain white mask to her face, she took a breath as she slipped the quiver on her back.

Her mind wandered, like it had done a lot since Batman called her out on her identity, Oliver Queen's daughter, a difficult legacy to live up to she supposed. She felt free, no longer having to deal with her father and his controlling nature when it came to her destiny, she wanted to be her own person, Roman gave her that freedom, but then again….both identities gave her Damian.

Damian had been such a gentlemen these last few months and she didn't know why, but it killed her knowing how much she was hurting him, constantly looking at her phone showed her how much he cared about her just by the amount of text messages, voice mails and phone calls she got in a given day from him.

Their second date was wonderful, she felt like she was at home in his arms as they had pizza while watching the French musical, would going back to being Oliver Queen's daughter and not as an agent to Black Mask take him away or would it draw her closer?

She removed her mask and let her face be seen in the mirror, what had she become? These thoughts plagued her sometimes, but whenever it happens, she felt herself enter a sleep like state and she would wake up eight hours later completely refreshed.

Damian was the one part of her life she never forgot or never got off of her mind, she thought back to their second date, the magic the two of them shared, would they even be able to share those days when and if she returned to normal?

"_Tomorrow you'll be worlds away…and yet with your my world has started_." She murmured "_Will we ever meet again? I was born to be with you. And I swear I will be true."_

She didn't know what Damian would say, but she knew…she hoped he would forgive her and love her the same way he always had.

* * *

Alberto Falcone stood in front of his men, they met in the old Falcone shipping yard his father owned decades ago, this was his legacy, and he was going to take it back.

"No speeches, we shoot anything and everything that stands in our way." He sneered "This is our city, and no man in a mask will take it away from us."

His men smirked as the M4 rifles were being passed from man to man, the clips next followed by anything else they desired, submachine guns, shotguns, knives, pistols, bazookas, whatever they desired it was theirs.

Falcone looked at his men and looked at his right "Mister Lawton, I have a special task for you."

Out in the shadows, Deadshot rose from the crate he sat on, his sniper rifle held in his arms "And that would be?"

"Kill Commissioner Akins and the Batman."

He nodded "Understood."

As Falcone turned back to his men, the sun slowly began to rise over the horizon as the last clip was pulled into the assault rifle.

"The time is now. The day is here." Falcone called out to his men like a military commander

* * *

"We end this, and we end this right now. The last thing we need is Falcone trying to take back what is ours."

Black Mask, the remaining False Facers, Deathstroke and the Black Rose met in their main base within Old Town.

"Deathstroke, go after Batman, make sure he doesn't get in our way."

Joe Wilson nodded in approval, without another word he took his leave. Victoria felt conflicted with everything going on.

"Tattoo, Rhino, Tunpeng, you will be with me. When the shooting starts, we won't let them go any further then we have to, if Falcone takes center Gotham we're done." A bitter tone came from Black Mask's voice

The False Facers nodded in approval.

"What of the men we already have in place?"

"Akins won't know what hit him." Finally he turned to Victoria

"I have something special in mind for you." His finger ran along her shoulder

She shuttered but did not dare move, she knew the second she did, Damian, her parents and even herself would be killed.

* * *

"So he just left?" Oliver asked confused and angry

Blake looked at Oliver and Laurel who had agreed to meet him in the Batcave; they needed a new strategy to end this gang war before it began.

"Yes, I can't raise him on his cell or track him either." Blake looked down at his leg; a brace was attached and took away his use of a cane

"John, you're not going to do this." Barbara rolled up the catwalk

John walked over to a rising platform, his Nightwing costume and equipment sat inside; he placed a hand on the right shoulder.

"What other choice do I have Barb?" John looked at her "Damian's gone and Oliver and Laurel don't know the city like I do."

"Then they'll have me."

Everyone turned to Damian walking back inside the Batcave, his hands were in his pockets, Blake did nothing more but glare at him.

"I know where I stand." He approached Blake "Between Black Mask and the people of Gotham. How do we begin?"

* * *

The sun slowly began to rise as Michael Akins stood in his SWAT armor, his rifle slung over his arm as he walked down the two sixteen man rows that stood on his left and right within the main complex of Arkham Asylum.

"Gentlemen, we have one more day until this so called revolution." Akins slowly walked down the middle of the rows "We'll be ready for these gang leaders. When they see us, they will wet themselves with blood."

"Oh rah!" The men yelled

"We will join the people's heroes we will follow where they go, we will learn their little secrets and we will know the things they know." Akins looked at them all "Tomorrow is our judgment day."

"What about the Batman sir?"

"The Bat's really got us over the table on this one. He's jeopardized all of our lives and the lives of every good citizen in this city. So from here on out… forget the rubber bullets. You see anyone in a mask... you shoot to kill." Akins declared "Now move it out!"

As the SWAT teams began to move out the door, Akins approached one soldier in particular.

"Brendan, I trust you're going to not follow the actions of your father?"

Brendan looked at him "What do you mean?"

"Last time, Peter let a vicious killer get away, you make the same mistakes Captain, and we're going to have an issue."

Brendan Foley nodded "I won't let you or my men down."

* * *

Damian stood on the rooftop overlooking the center of the fight scene, the streets were cleared, and it felt like a warzone, he knew the people were scared and he knew what was to be coming in a few minutes.

He held his cowl in his right hand, a sigh left his lips as he slipped it over his head and tapped the radio.

"Everything in place?"

"_For the most part. The GCPD is on its way to stop this, but Falcone and Black Mask's men have broken off. Oracle is tracking them as we speak."_

"All I care about is Black Mask, let Falcone take care of the others." Batman growled

"_The quicker we get this done, the quicker we get this done."_

Damian sighed and released his fingers from the side of his cowl "_One more dawn, one more day. _One day more."

**Okay, I know this chapter was a filler, but I felt like this was a good calm before the storm leading up to a major fight chapter which probably take me awhile assuming things go well these next few days, best case scenario will be up by Saturday or Sunday. Also I know this was _Les Miserables_ inspired here so don't hate on me for this, this will be the last chapter with that type of theme in it.**

** So stay tuned for the next chapter!**


	14. Chapter 14: The Gang War

**Hey again everyone! Sorry for the delay, I'll explain below what happened.**

The morning air was gentle, it silently swept through the streets of Gotham; picking up an occasional piece of trash and having it dance in mid-air and gently set it back down when the wind was done with it.

Batman looked down as the Falcone crime family marched through the streets, Alberto took the lead of his men, his eyes patrolled the streets, across the street, Black Mask took the lead; he couldn't tell if this was West Side Story or a gang fight, maybe they were talking things out peacefully.

He had twisted the buckle of his belt and let his body become blended as the door on his roof burst open, several SWAT snipers took position along the rooftops, Batman knew this was going to end badly, he knew what he had to do, only problem, there were five of them, he could take out two at a time, then the fifth one could take him out. He just decided to wait and see what happened.

One possible scenario could be they worked something out, which was the more hopeful one for him, this way he didn't have to get his hands too dirty. Second scenario would be they just started shooting, which would get Damian's hands really dirty. Third one that came to mind would be the GCPD would try to take out Black Mask and Alberto and send the streets of the Narrows into total war and the death toll could escalate into the hundreds.

"I'm giving you one chance to surrender Black Mask, return what it is mine and no one will need to die." Roman growled

"If you think I'm going to hand this city back to you, then you are crazier then you look. I'd much rather leave it to Batman then you." Black Mask snarled

Batman continued to watch, then he saw it, the guns began to rise from both sides, he knew it was going to be bad.

He didn't know who fired the shot, but as he glanced down, he spotted Rhino, one of Black Mask's member of the False Facers go down with a bullet to the head. Black Mask began to back up along with his men who split up and ran into the streets, Alberto gave chase with his men running after them, splitting up and going into the streets.

Batman approached the GCPD officers, it was time to end this, and he approached the first two snipers and slammed their heads together. As the other three looked, he deactivated his cloaking, his eyes making contact to the snipers as they prepared to fire.

He was on them quick, knocking the sniper away from two of them, laying a series of quick strike punches into their chests and then slamming a fist into their heads, knocking two down and leaving one left.

Batman approached him, who was quickly backing away, he grabbed the sniper by the throat and his radio went off.

"_All units, all units, Black Mask and Falcone's men are on the move, get ready to kill. Black Mask is heading for the monorail; Falcone is heading for the shipping yard._

Damian growled and slammed his head into the snipers, knocking him out on contact. He immediately reached for the radio, allowed the cowl's radio to tune into the frequency and smiled as he tuned into another station.

"Blake, I've got the GCPD's radio tuned into the cowl, I'll be able to listen in. I found them both, I just…"

"_You don't know who you want to go after?"_

"My whole reason for getting Sionis was to get Victoria away from him, but if Falcone is taken down…I'll stop another crime boss."

"_Let the GCPD stop Falcone, you need to stop the man we've trying to figure out for months and now we have a chance to save Tori and stop Roman and now your chickening out. Your father would never…"_

Damian changed the channel, he couldn't stand when Blake undermined him, his eyes scanned the battle field, bullets began to fly from three sides, and he knew if he wanted to get to Black Mask, he'd need the gangs to stay alive.

His eyes went wide as he pulled out a set of binoculars from his belt and spotted him, Black Mask was walking toward a set of metal steps, he was heading for the train along with Deathstroke and a few members of his crime organization; it was time, but first things first, he had to clear a path

He leapt off the building, his cape was used as a glider as he soared in the air, from above, he could see the gangs firing bullets at their foes, then he saw the GCPD ready to take on both gangs, he knew they had to be defeated.

Batman dropped to the ground, his form stuck out in the middle of the SWAT cops, their eyes went wide.

"Its Batman! Get him!"

He immediately went on the offensive, taking a pellet from his belt and tossed it in the middle of the crowd, smoke surrounded the area and the cops started coughing hard, Batman immediately retaliated while he had time, slamming some of their heads together, and others he tossed to the ground and slammed either his fist or boot into their stomachs.

As he looked with the smoke cleared, only James Gordon remained, he lowered his rifle "Akins put a hit on you."

"I figured." Batman approached "I need your help, Black Mask is heading for the monorail, and I'll get him. You need to get the GCPD away from me."

"I'll see what I can do." Gordon nodded removing his helmet "When this is over, can we talk?"

Batman nodded and pressed a key on his belt, a motor went off in the background and the RAPTOR parked next to him, Batman jumped in and drove off, with the front of the car coming over his head.

* * *

Michael Akins fired another shot from his pistol, accurately tearing into the skull of one of Falcone's men, he was held up at city hall with his elite guard; Brendan Foley stood at his right, firing warning rounds from his rifle.

"Sir, have any ideas?"

"Find Falcone, if he's down, this'll be easier." Michael reloaded his pistol and fired

Alberto Falcone rose from cover behind an SUV and fired a few rounds toward both Akins and Foley, but the bullets didn't hit their target. He pressed his fingers to his ear.

"Take the shot!" He commanded

The sun took on the glass of a scope as a bullet soared through the air and hit Brendan through the chest; Akins' grew with fear as the sniper began to aim at him.

Deadshot smiled "This is where it ends…Commissioner."

"Floyd Lawton…you have failed this city."

Deadshot turned to Green Arrow standing behind him, he immediately went on the offensive and drew two arrows, firing at Deadshot, he quickly dodged and fired from his wrist turrets, which caused Oliver to step out of the way, he knew this had to end, he lost too many friends to Deadshot and now after twenty years, it finally ended.

Five arrows were drawn and fired, Oliver could only smile as Floyd took three to the chest and fell to the ground, Oliver walked over to Deadshot and ripped his shirt open, tattooed to his body were the names of his victims, two of them stood out _Andy Diggle _and _John Diggle. _

It had been twenty years since Diggle died, his best friend and partner finally had a chance to take Deadshot, cornered and ready to pull the trigger, Oliver had helped as best as he could, but then Deadshot got the jump on them, sliced Oliver's leg open and sent a round into John's chest, killing him.

He looked down at the streets to gunfire being sent out between combatants as Michael Akins was taking on Alberto.

"Die…just like your father." Akins fired every round his pistol could send

The bullets slammed into Alberto's stomach and one went right in the middle of his forehead, sending his body down and dust flew around where his body made impact.

He tapped the radio on his suit "All officers, Falcone is down, proceed on Black Mask, do not let him get away."

* * *

"_All officers, Falcone is down, proceed on Black Mask, do not let him get away."_

Batman sighed as he drove the RAPTOR into a back ally way "Oracle, did you hear that?"

"_I sure did, seems like Akins is finishing up business, they're rounding up Falcone's mercenaries and everyone is moving to the False Facers, Roman is still heading for the train." _

"I'm here."

The RAPTOR rotated and started to stop with a skid, the canopy opened and Batman jumped out, running up the stairs heading toward the monorail.

His emotions and energy were running with adrenaline, he didn't know what to expect when he got up there but he knew he had to get Victoria out of Black Mask's hands.

A fist made impact with Batman's chest causing his body to slightly fall backwards, as he looked up, Deathstroke was standing between him and the door, with Black Mask nodding without another word as the door closed.

"You really are a sucker for punishment huh?" Deathstroke smiled under his mask

"No, this time, we end it." Batman growled

Both men assumed a fighting stance, Deathstroke went on the offensive and struck first, but Batman grabbed his fist and twisted Deathstroke's arm, causing a sight groan of pain to escape his lips as the caped crusader slammed a boot into Deathstroke's boot.

Anger began to build, he needed to get to Victoria and now Deathstroke was the only thing getting in the way, he needed to end this.

As Deathstroke recovered, Damian went on the offensive, slamming a fist into Deathstroke's head, he grabbed him and slammed it into the metal of the monorail's entrance, as he staggered, Damian slammed a boot into his chest and sent him to the ground.

"Where is Black Mask going!?" Batman slammed his boot into Deathstroke's chest

"I'll never tell you Batman…" Deathstroke coughed as he felt blood stain his lip

"Well then, your useless to me." He growled and slammed a fist into his skull, rendering him unconscious

He was running out of time, Batman drew his grapple gun and leapt off of the monorail, as he glided through the air, he let himself go and fired his grapple gun and watched as it went into the window and attached to something, he felt his body being pulled into the window and entered the subway.

Three men were waiting inside, with Black Mask standing at the controls of the train, there was no sign of Victoria.

Batman growled as he went on the offensive, the two men didn't stand a chance as he slammed both of their heads together and knocked them to the ground, the third man drew a crowbar and tried to slam it into Batman's body, but he was no match just as his partners as Batman grabbed it and knocked it out of his hands, slamming it into his stomach and then his head.

As he turned, a bullet soared past him, Black Mask stood facing him, revolver out and smoke coming out of the barrel.

"You have something I want." Batman growled

Black Mask didn't say another word, something that struck Batman as odd, he approached with ferocity and determination as Black Mask fired two more rounds, he knocked the gun out of his hand and grabbed him by the throat, throwing his mask off to reveal a man with several tattoos over his face.

"Oracle," Batman used his free hand and tapped his earpiece "Is this him?"

"_No, this is Tattoo, Black Mask's top associate."_

"Where is Black Mask!?"

"Sorry, I'm not talking no more than Joe did." Tattoo growled

"Fine." Batman growled as he pressed the emergency break

The monorail came to a screeching halt, Batman tied the rope of his grapple gun to Tattoo's leg and opened the door, letting him dangle.

"You can tell me or you can go to Blackgate in a body bag." Batman threatened

"If your going to intimidate someone, pick a better spot."

"No." Batman let him go

Tattoo flew down, screaming a combination of swears and shrieks but was stopped as Damian grabbed the wire, pulling him back up and held him by the ankle.

"I can keep doing this all day, where is he?"

"Pock…pocket." Tattoo muttered as he caught his breath

Damian reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a CD, he growled and looked at him.

"Thank you." He let Tattoo go.

Tattoo flew, his body moving quickly with curses flying out of his lips, the ground continued to get closer and closer by the inch until he felt himself dangle in mid air, the rope was tied and Batman was gone.

* * *

Damian removed his cowl as Barbara slid the disk into a CD port in the Batcomputer, he looked around curiously.

"Where's John?"

"Finding Laurel and Oliver. We're on…"

The screen came to life as Black Mask sat in the center, his trademark mask on his face.

"_Hello Damian Wayne, I trust by now you've figured out the man I had on the field was not me. I have never entered the battlefield today, but I guess it has gone in neither of our favors, and I bet your looking for me right now as we speak, but, before I go out, I have one more surprise for you." _

Black Mask stepped aside and Damian's eyes went wide with fear

"No!" he cried

He ran to the table, almost like he could climb through the screen, his gloved hands clenched into fists as he saw Victoria laying in a coma in a hospital bed with a life support machine attached to a point on her chest.

"_You see Mister Wayne, if you couldn't figure it out by now, Miss Queen has been under my control since her stupid father sent her after me, now I have no problem keeping his identity a secret, but since she has been under the chip used by our dear friend the Mad Hatter, she has revealed such secrets with me. Secrets like your relationship with her, and now I'm giving you a choice. Either you let me leave Gotham with three million dollars and a private jet completely fueled or the life support machine she's on will go out. I'm giving you all the time in the world, but attached to this disk is a set of coordinates, that will be where you can find me. Good day Mister Wayne."_

Damian stepped to the side as Barbara spun herself around, he didn't want her to see him cry, see him so hurt, so depressed, so worried.

"Damian, we can save her."

Damian began to take his armor off without another word "I know, but I need to see her first."

**Okay, so there are three reasons why this took so long. One, I had work pulling a fast one and assigning me day hours instead of night so it has cut me back during my personal time. Two, it was fourth of July and I was busy over the week with work and family drama to work on anything major. Three, I had writer's block, I'm trying to plan out the rest of this story and I'm having too much fun with Black Mask to end him so quickly, so there's going to be two more chapters with him and then we move onwards!**

**With fifteen, we'll be introduced to the primary antagonist of the story Victor Fries and his evolution into the cold hearted villain we've all come to know! **

**Also, expect another Batman book coming out soon featuring my favorite Robin Damian soon!**


	15. Chapter 15: Heart of Fries

Damian stepped inside Victoria's room in Gotham General's Intensive Treatment Center with Blake right behind him, they left Laurel and Oliver within the Batcave, just so they didn't over react, Barbara could take care of them without a problem.

His heart began to thump extremely fast, his emotions were running high when he saw her lying in the hospital bed, her eyes were closed, her blonde hair was tussled and the wires from the life support machine were hidden under the blanket. Damian walked over and carefully took her hand in his and gently ran his thumb along the bones as Blake walked toward the machine.

It looked like a typical life support machine, wires were coming from the side, the ticker was beeping and spiking like normal with the orange line, but it was a dark blue almost black with an off and on button and had a timer on it.

"This isn't hospital doesn't make machines like this." Blake looked at it and tapped it with his cane "This is custom made."

Damian looked at him "How so?"

Blake followed the wire down into her blanket and slowly lifted it, when he saw it, he almost vomited "Damian, look."

He let go of Victoria's hand and walked over, his brows tightened and anger began to spread as he saw a large hole in Victoria's chest, the wires were inside and her heart was missing.

"I'm going to kill Black Mask." Damian looked away and stormed toward the door

"Wait a minute, I do know who made this, but you need to find the surgeon who removed this." Blake bellowed

"Who made it?"

"Simple." Blake pointed at the back

The back of the machine had a white circle with a white W in the middle with a C close to it.

"WayneCorp." Damian growled

"Doctor Victor Fries, I recognize his handiwork, he made this thing years ago, but it looks like someone weaponized it."

"Fine, I'll talk to Fries, but first the doctor." He looked at Victoria's schedule and got a name "Thomas Eliot."

"Yes, of course I remember the operation, but I'm not going to talk about it."

* * *

Thomas Eliot was a man in his early fifties with red hair that was slicked back and ice blue eyes; he was being dressed in his operating gown and gloves by a nurse who wasn't paying attention to the conversation.

"Then tell me about what Black Mask threatened you with then Doctor." Damian growled "Because I know that's what happened."

Thomas glared at him, he lowered his mask "Nurse, could you give us a minute, I'll be right there."

The nurse nodded and proceeded inside; Thomas looked at the door and continued to have his hands held up so they wouldn't get contaminated.

"Look, I have lived in this city for as long as your dad did, he was my best friend since childhood, even in college at Princeton; I was devastated when he died." Thomas looked at Damian "You look exactly like him, I mean, I'd love to help your girlfriend, but if I do, Black Mask will kill me and my family."

"But Doctor Eliot…" Damian started

Eliot's bottom was opening the door "I'm sorry Mister Wayne, but that's my final word on the matter."

The door swung closed behind him, leaving Damian in the scrub room, he sighed and slammed a fist into the wall as he stormed out.

"Blake, I just talked with Eliot, he won't budge because his family is in danger." Damian remarked

"_I had a feeling; the man always was a spineless coward. I called Fox, Fries is in, if you want to go see him, then by all means. He does have medical background as well as a scientific one." _

* * *

The door opened to the cryogenics department and Batman silently turned the lights on, what was inside surprised to find what was inside.

A large tube sat in the back of the room running on its own generator, the liquid inside was causing the tube to glow a bright blue, various test tubes and beakers were near the tube and a computer was stationed in the back of the room.

His cape swept behind him as he approached the tube, feeling a chill coming from the tubes, his gloved hand moved over the glass and his eyes went wide inside his cowl.

A woman was asleep inside, her blonde hair moved with the water, her skin looked pale as a ghost. A small terminal lit up as Batman approached it, his fingers moved over the keys and he quickly read the data.

"Nora Fries," Batman said under his breath

The figures on the screen showed various notes about her disease called McGregor Syndrome, something Damian would have to look up later.

The door in the back swung open "Sorry I'm late Nora I…"

The man who stepped inside immediately went wide eyed when he saw Batman; he reached for his table, where a gun was waiting.

"Wait, I was told you could help."

"Just get away from my wife!" The man yelled

Batman stepped away, the man had brown hair that was slightly balding on the sides, grey eyes that were magnified by a pair of half-moon glasses and slightly pale skin, his white lab coat over his brown top read the name _Victor Fries._

"Doctor Victor Fries? You must be the head of this division correct?"

"Yes, why do you care?" Victor glared

"A woman was attached to your life support machine. I was told you could help." Batman reached for his belt and pulled out a photo

Victor took it and glanced at it, he recognized it which was indicated by his eyes narrowing "This was my first creation, a means to save her." He glanced at Nora

Batman glanced at him "I'm sorry. I never heard of what she has. McGregor Syndrome?"

"It's a rare genetic disease." Fries pressed a hand to the glass "It slowly eats away at the victim's body until it eventually reaches the blood stream and dies."

"How long has Nora had it?"

"Ten years, I've had her in this for the last four. She was diagnosed with stage two. I tried my best and I managed to find a cure for stage one, but now I can't seem to stabilize it to find a cure for the second."

"Does WayneCorp know you have all this?"

Fries nodded "Yes, they allowed me to work on this alone, I wanted it that way, no one else was going to help my wife but me….she's all I have."

"Fighting for a cure for your wife? I find that very noble Victor." Batman smiled "But I need your help, the woman who has been attached to your machine….she means a lot to me. Is there anything…"

"Yes, yes I can. She's at Gotham General is she not?" Fries looked at the picture "I recognize the drape on the side, Nora spent years there."

Batman nodded as Victor grabbed a bag "I'll get down there and take care of her. What are you going to do Batman?"

He opened the door and turned his head to Fries "Put an end to an old friend."

* * *

Black Mask stood inside the meeting place; seven men were with him, each one armed with an M4 assault rifles, he was ready for when Wayne arrived, knowing not only how much he wanted to take Batman out of commission, taking out the son of the Prince of Gotham would definitely secure him, with the False Facers in Blake Gate, he would have to start all over again.

He felt no remorse for what happened, no regret for leaving them including Deathstroke, who by now was half way to Mexico, if Joe Wilson was anything like Slade, he would have some form of common sense and run, of course while Slade had the brains and the bronze, Joe was nothing like that, preferring to fight and kill rather than let the fight continue onwards by a different tactic.

Footsteps echoed along the snow covered floor, for early December, Gotham was experiencing a snow storm like no other, the first in decades from what Black Mask could remember. He looked out as a figure stood in the shadows, no distinguishing marks, nothing but a figure.

"Damian Wayne!?" Black Mask called out

He nodded "Yeah, it's me, I have what you want, now just promise me she'll live."

"Oh she will, now give me the money."

He nodded again and tossed a briefcase into the air, its leather casing slid along the floor of the warehouse and landed at Black Mask's feet.

"Good, now die." Black Mask picked up the briefcase and snapped his fingers

Assault rifle rounds from sixteen separate weapons fired on his location, no one could see it, but once everyone reloaded, he smiled as his body fell to the floor. He tossed the briefcase to one of his associates.

"Make sure he's dead."

The men silently walked out to where the young Wayne's body silently sat, as they disappeared from the light within the building the door slammed shut behind them.

Black Mask looked in horror as he heard the screams of his men cry out in agony.

"He's here!" He called out

Batman was here, Black Mask knew this was the end for him, but how could Wayne have called Batman here?

As he looked, his associate opened the briefcase and was met with a face full of smoke screen; he coughed hard and dropped the case which still had smoke coming out of it.

A hand grabbed the thug by the back of his head and pulled him into the darkness, Black Mask could hear bones snapping as his final guard lay on the floor.

"What do you want!?" Black Mask called out drawing one of his revolvers

"Your life." Batman growled

Batman approached, coming out of the darkness, Black Mask aimed and fired, Batman's body moving in such precision that he dodged it and threw one of his batarangs at Black Mask, the bat shaped projectile slammed into the barrel of the gun and as the trigger was pressed, the gun exploded, taking off one of his gloves, burning the sleeve of his coat and having him draw away in pain.

The caped crusader took the moment and pounced, moving with such accuracy that by the time Black Mask drew his second revolver; Batman knocked it away and grabbed him by the throat with one hand.

"Knew I'd catch you sooner or later." Batman growled "Now, I end you."

"Sure you will Batman, you may take me down, but what I have set in motion will only cause Gotham to freeze, I won. You lost." Black Mask started to laugh

Police sirens rang outside as Batman threw Black Mask onto the floor, the door burst open and members of the GCPD had their guns at the ready, Michael Akins walked through the crowd with Bullock.

"Get something to hold him." Akins ordered pointing at Black Mask then turned to Batman "Arrest the Batman."

"Sir…" Bullock looked at Akins "He did just hand us the biggest crime lord of the city."

"I don't care, I ordered his immediate extermination, now arrest Batman!" He ordered

By the time the two were done debating, Batman was already gone from sight, the only sound that could be heard was the sound of an engine roaring in the background. Akins growled and slammed his fist into his hand; once again, Batman was gone once again.

**Alright! Black Mask is finally done! Now I can move onto the main villain of this story! With Nora's condition of McGregor syndrome, it is actually a plot line from Batman and Robin, but since we all know how terrible that movie was, I wanted to make it seem more realistic with a Nolanverse kind of feel.**

**There will be some more DamianxVictoria content next chapter as well as the Queen family reunion in sixteen which should be up this weekend. So until then, see everyone soon!**


	16. Chapter 16: The Betrayal

Damian sat alone in Victoria's room a day passed since he met with Victor Fries, Blake had gone home to help Barbara and Oliver along with Laurel were on their way, Victoria went into surgery a few hours ago, within that time he took down the city's most powerful crime lord, with Black Mask on his way to Arkham, and the False Facers locked up in Blackgate, maybe the city could get back to normal.

But just based on what his father told him when he was younger, Gotham was a city that never seemed to see calmness, it always seemed like when one problem was complete, there would always be another one to arise from the shadows. When Scarecrow was sent to the Asylum, Ra's al Ghul and the League of Shadows arrived, when Joker was captured, Two Face almost killed Jim Gordon and Bane was dethroned, Talia al Ghul almost destroyed Gotham. His father was right, Gotham wasn't beyond saving; it just had a lot of scars.

The door opened as a pair of nurses pulled a bed in next to Damian and his eyes grew wide when he saw Victoria, she was asleep but breathing and not being hooked up to the life support machine, Fries walked in and took a breath.

"Okay, so for this being the first time I was in surgery in ten years, I really think I did well." He smiled

"Is she..?"

He patted Damian on the shoulder "She's fine Mister Wayne, she went through it like a trooper, just let her sleep for now. I will want her here for the next few days for close observations and she should avoid anything stressful."

He nodded "Thank you Fries."

"Also, one other thing." He reached into his pocket "When we were prepping her for surgery, our equipment went mad for a few minutes and we found this."

A microchip small enough that Fries was able to hold on his thumb and index finger, Damian took it and held it in the palm of his hand, this was what controlled Victoria, this was Jervis' legacy.

"We removed it and we found she had a look on her face of relief, was that causing her stress?"

He shook his head "Not anymore." Damian threw it on the ground and slammed his shoe on it

"Alright, if you need anything at all…"

He nodded "Fries, I heard about your wife Nora. Luke Fox told me, I work in WayneCorp now."

"Oh is that so Mister Wayne?" He cocked an eyebrow

Damian stood up and the pair shook hands "Victor, I promise you, when the finances are squared away, the Wayne Foundation will donate enough money for you to continue to find a cure for Nora."

"You would do that?"

"Of course." Damian smiled "It's what my father would have done."

"Bless you sir. Bless you." Victor said in pure happiness

With that, Victor took his leave and the nurses followed him out, as Damian closed the door behind him, he had a chance to watch her sleep, he had a lot of questions, but mostly it was about them. Would she remember how much they cared about each other? Their dates or even just the time they spent together? He didn't know, but he would find out when she woke up.

Her body slowly began to stir, her green eyes slowly started to open as she turned on her right side, the first sight she saw was Damian's face.

"Hey..." She said sleepily

He smiled as her hand took his "Good morning. How do you feel?"

"Great." She smiled "Never better."

Damian leaned in and kissed her forehead "I was worried."

"I'm sorry about everything with Black Mask." She let her head hit the pillow "I should have told you."

"No, no you had every right not to tell me." He knew he had to tell her, he had to "Tori listen I…"

The door burst open and the pair turned to Oliver and Laurel who had walking inside, a look of relief was on Laurel's face while Oliver had a look Damian realized was the concerned father look.

"Tori, you okay sweetheart?" Laurel walked over to her daughter and kissed her forehead, moving some of her blonde locks away

"I'm good mom." She looked at Oliver "Papa."

Oliver didn't know what to say, Damian knew just based on their conversations he was the stern father, but he saw something different in him, Oliver's face calmed and he walked over to Tori and kissed her on the cheek "I'm sorry sweetheart."

Damian let go of Tori's hand and stood to the side "I'll let you three have some time together, I have to go into the office."

Tori looked at him "What about…"

"We'll talk later." He winked at her "I'll be here at dinner time and I'll stay overnight."

She smiled and nodded.

* * *

"She's okay, woke up but I wanted her to meet with her parent's." Damian told Luke and his father Morgan

They called Morgan Fox in for help with the finances, he had a plan and had this plan brewing for a while now, he wanted to not only protect Gotham as Batman, but as Damian Wayne, he wanted to take his company back and Morgan was the best person to call.

Morgan was in his late forties to his early fifties, he had seen pictures of Lucius, Morgan's father and he looked like a younger version, short black hair with a few gray hair spots coming in and a mustache over his lip.

"Well, we're happy for you Damian." Morgan smiled, then pursed his lips together and slipped on his glasses "But we need to figure this financial out, based on my calculations, the company has about fifty million dollars missing."

"Stealing?" Luke looked at his dad

"Not sure, based on these figures, the contracts are hurting, WayneCorp is turning a profit, but so far, we're still in the hole half a billion dollars."

Damian rubbed his temples "Must be Black Mask, maybe Paxton…"

He was hushed by Luke who pointed at the door as footsteps were heard outside, Luke opened the door as a trio of men were walking to the elevator, two men Damian recognized as security, but the third man had silver hair forming a crown of sorts in his black hair, his face gave a look of scheming and treachery.

"Who's that?"

"Ferris Boyle, WayneCorp's head, he was appointed by Paxton." Luke whispered

As Boyle and the security men went into the elevator, Damian turned to Morgan "Track the elevator, come on Luke."

"Where are we going?"

"You'll see." Damian took a running start for the stairs.

* * *

Victor Fries adjusted the camera on his computer, it was set to record, these journals were the way he kept things in order, and this was the first one before he would sell his idea to Wane Enterprises.

The light turned red as Victor cleared his throat "My name is Doctor Victor Fries, I am recording what…I pray will be mankind's first step toward immortality. Behind me you see the CC-100," he stepped aside and Nora's cryotube became the camera's focus "a cryogenic freezing chamber of my own design. I created it with the express purpose of freezing patients with incurable diseases….patients like my beloved wife Nora."

He took another pause as a hand ran over the cold glass of Nora's pod "I have created a cure for stage one of her disease called McGregor Syndrome, my goal within the next eighteen months is to develop a cure from stage one using…"

His monologue was cut off by three men bursting into the door, two members of security and Ferris Bole.

"Get away from that equipment!" Boyle barked then turned to his men "Shut this stuff down."

As the two men began to move, Victor immediately turned to his boss.

"Stop!" He pleased "This is my experiment!"

"Your unauthorized experiment, I shut down funding for this project six months ago. Now I come to find out you've been stealing money from us for this!?" Boyle retaliated with pure hatred in his voice

Damian and Luke entered from the stairwell and heard shouting; Damian took to the left while Luke took to the right of the opened door.

"What are you talking about?" Victor looked at Boyle then darted his head when the sound of button's pressing caught his attention "You can't stop this now! My wife is in there!"

"So bring her out then Victor."

"No! If I do she'll die! She can't leave that chamber until the medication is properly created and tested!" Victor snapped back "The process cannot be interrupted now!"

"Shut it down." He said to his right hand security guard

Victor took Boyle by the arms "This is her only chance Mister Boyle!"

"Enough!" Boyle knocked his arms away "This is my equipment and I have every legal right to use it. And I say she is shut down." He growled with the last statement

Victor knew he had to act fast, Damian felt so bad for Fries that this was happening. His eyes widened when he saw Victor swipe the M4 from one of the security guard's belt and aimed it at Boyle.

"No! You stay away from Nora! You murderer!"

Boyle's eyes went wide, but then he calmed down "Victor, I'm sorry. I lost my temper, it doesn't have to come to this, why don't we go into my office and we can discuss this."

One moment, that was all it took, one moment of deception and Victor lowered his arms that was all Boyle needed. A kick to the chest sent Fries into the tubes of cryogenic liquid, a bright blue smoke coming from the machine enveloped Victor and with a quick second, the chemicals from being mixed slowly began to rumble.

"Move, move now!" Boyle called to his men

The three men moved out as quickly as they could, Damian looked at Luke, who was watching with sheer terror.

"Fox move!" Damian yelled, his tone grew cold like Batman's as he leapt, knocking Luke to the ground as the chemicals exploded

The resulting explosion shook the entire building, Boyle, his men, Luke and Damian were on the ground, and a thin sheet of ice was jaggedly coming from the entrance to Fries' lab.

Boyle looked over at the two men "Fox? Why the hell are you up here?"

Luke's eyes met his boss and instant panic began to sweep over him, his words began to jumble, he knew he would be exposed.

"We were on our way back from the cafeteria." Damian spoke up

Boyle cocked an eyebrow "The cafeteria is on the second floor."

The two young men stood and Damian narrowed his eyes "Well, we would have been down on the fourth floor sooner had someone not used the elevator, so we took the stairs and when we heard screaming we thought something was happening."

Luke nodded "Yeah, yeah."

Boyle glared at Damian and the two men entered a moment where another rivalry could have formed "You speak of what happened here Fox, you will lose your job and I'll make sure you never work in Gotham again."

Damian smiled "And if you fire my employee Mister Boyle." He walked over until both men were face to face "I will see to it that you are arrested with manslaughter."

"You have no proof." Boyle smiled "How do we know this could be an accident."

"Watch your tone Ferris, hired by Paxton or not, you still have Wayne on your front door." Damian reminded

"Very well Mister Wayne, you don't speak of this, and then we won't either." Boyle nodded and left with a huff

As the door to the elevator closed and it slowly rose, Damian slipped into his jacket and removed his ski mask.

"He's right, we have nothing."

"Oh yeah?" Damian slipped his mask on and motioned for Fox to follow

The room was covered in ice from head to toe, the computer was the only thing that was still working and Fries was slumped in a corner, his skin had turned ice white. As Damian began to type on the computer, Fox walked over and felt Fries' pulse.

"He's dead."

"I know, I know." Damian inserted a flash drive "luckily his computer still works."

After a few seconds, the computer beeped and Damian removed the drive "I downloaded everything Fries had on McGregor syndrome and his video logs, Boyle won't be able to get his hands on this."

He typed a few more keys and the computer began to reformat itself, while this happened, he carefully walked over to the terminal that showed Nora's stats, the machine was going haywire and if he didn't do anything soon, Nora was going to die.

His fingers went over the keys while Luke checked the computer "You know how to do that?"

"I have some experience with computer programming, took some classes in college. Best I can do is stabilize her."

"Is she alive?"

"Barely," Damian let his eyes focus on the screen "she'll need to be monitored heavily in order to stabilize her."

Fox nodded as Damian kept pressing keys, until finally everything read stable. With that, the pair departed leaving Fries alone in his ice prison.

* * *

The door to Victoria's room opened and Damian stepped in, a smile spread on his face when he saw her sitting in her bed, her phone in hand and headphones in her ears, not paying attention at all.

He silently walked over and placed a light kiss on her neck which made her smile and remove her headphones "Well, someone's very affectionate."

"Well, I missed you too much." Damian smiled at her

As Victoria was about to kiss him, her eyes caught his, and she could tell there was something wrong.

"What happened?" She asked

He looked away "An innocent man just lost his life because of Black Mask."

Tori didn't know what to say as she placed a hand on his shoulder, she knew she had to change the subject "What did you want to tell me before?"

"When you get out of here. meet me at the Palacades, Thomas and Martha memorial boys home, go inside, find the piano, press three keys, when the book shelf opens, go inside." Damian looked at her "I'll tell you then."

"Can't you just tell me?" She asked

"It would be easier if I showed you Tori." He looked at her "I don't want any more secrets between us."

She smiled gently "Neither do I." She thought of something "My father told you…"

"That your Lady Arrow? Indeed he did." Damian smiled

Something dawned on her as Tori watched his body language, there was a certain familiarity to it, he reminded her of Batman, just from the two encounters she had with him.

Tori decided not to press the subject as Damian pulled up a chair and put one of her headphones in his ear, she gently let her head rest on his shoulder as she turned her music back on her phone.

**Alright sixteen is up! I really want to thank everyone for their kind words with this story, this is the most fun I've ever had writing a story in a long time. **

**Seventeen won't be up until next weekend due to RL things going on, but as a sneak preview, there will be some mother and son bonding for Damian and Selina as well as flashbacks into Damian's childhood with his parents.**


	17. Chapter 17: A turn for the worst

Catwoman's fingers glistened over the safe and gently turned the dial, once to the right, a second time to the left and a third time to the right. She had done this hundreds of times and it never got old, though she felt it sometimes, her mid-forties after birthing two children wasn't a fun time for her.

Though she loved her family, her daughter Maria was exactly like her, even at fifteen she was already turning heads, Bruce always did say no man was good enough for his daughter, she was such a daddy's girl, she always had Bruce wrapped around her finger.

Of course, Damian was the same way, while she and her son had always been close, when Bruce decided he was going to train Damian, she continued to try and be a part of it, though in his own way, Damian always went out of his way to make Selina a part of his teenage years, even if it was a little thing like taking her out to lunch when Bruce was at work and Maria was at school or asking her to come watch his baseball games in Star City, she always had time to be with her children.

Her hands slowly opened the safe and revealed a safe deposit box, a hand went to her wrist and removed a lock pick and slowly lowered down her infrared glasses over her eyes and slowly began to work her way into the lock.

"It's a late night for burglary Mrs. Kyle?" A voice growled behind her

She turned to Batman standing behind her, his cape fluttered in the wind and his arms were folded over his chest, a determined look came across his face as she raised her lenses and stood up, looking at the caped crusader.

"Well, well, the rumors are true." Selina smiled "Batman has returned."

"You know me; I always like to keep my enemies guessing." Batman smirked

Their bodies began to move, every move Selina made, Batman made the opposite, she was waiting for him to make a move and vice versa, of course, this was how they always used to do it.

* * *

_Eight years prior._

"Come on Damian; try to keep up with me."

Damian tried to mimic his mom's movements, Selina stood in front of him, her chocolate brown locks were tied back in a ponytail and she was wearing a pair of yoga pants and a black tank top while Damian wore a dark blue t-shirt and a pair of black basketball shorts.

"Mom, I'm trying, I'm trying."

He felt himself move in the opposite direction, he felt his feet feel uneasy and like he was going to fall, she had been teaching him how to do his footwork and he didn't know why his mom was pushing him so hard.

"Mom, can we stop?"

"The enemy will not stop." Selina flipped and slammed a foot into Damian's chest sending him into the ground "because you're too tired." She got down on one knee and held a hand in a chop position at his throat

As Damian looked up, Selina had a warm smile on her face as she helped her son to his feet "You just need to work on your footwork, as long as you know how your opponents technique, using your footwork can allow you to maneuver more easily."

* * *

Catwoman moved first, she raised her foot in an attempt to kick, Batman blocked it with his wrist and smirked as Selina retracted and attempted series of cobra strikes with her fists, Batman blocked each one, moving with accurate precision.

"Come on Mom, your better than this." Batman smirked "Is Dad keeping you in shape or has this cat been declawed?"

Selina sneered "You haven't seen anything yet."

Each strike was extremely fast, a kick followed by cobra strikes, than a whirlwind kick then attempting to punch him in the back, each move was met with Batman blocking each strike, and then a blocked with his arm turned to block her fist.

"You've gotten fast." Selina smirked "I'm sure your father will be impressed."

"Thanks." Batman smiled "Let's get out of here."

As he pressed a key on his belt, the Bat slowly began to spark to life and rose up so the seats were level with the rooftop, as Batman got in; Selina walked behind him, a headache began to plague her.

* * *

"Impressive, rental I take it?"

"You always did want me to move up in the world, not down."

Damian sat down at his desk with his feet propped up while Selina walked through the room, her eyes focused in on the shiny objects she didn't recognize.

"Where's your base?"

"Still underneath Wayne Manor, I'm thinking of having it moved…and building a second one."

Selina looked at him "A second cave? Where?"

"Arkham Island, the inmates there need a bit of observation, one of the doctors there has me a bit on edge. The name Hugo Strange ring a bell?"

She shook her head "No, I'm sure I can inquire with some old contacts."

"Things have changed here Mom; Gotham has changed a lot in the last quarter of the century."

"Well, I'm sure many things haven't…"

The door to his study opened as Blake walked in, when he spotted Selina, the pair rolled their eyes.

"Great, you again." Selina sighed

"Still seducing Congressmen? Congressman Gilly had a lengthy bit of say when he died about you."

"I'm sure; I was the best thing that ever happened to him." Selina smiled as she ran her nails along her top

"Uh…" Damian looked at them "The kid is confused here."

"Just something from my past kiddo, nothing to worry about." Selina smiled at her son

"Well, I'll leave you two to it. I have a meeting to attend."

"With whom?"

"Ferris Boyle, I need to talk to him about something that happened last month."

* * *

"Damian Wayne, a pleasure as always."

Damian and Boyle gently shook each other's hands; they met in Boyle's main office in WayneCorp headquarters in central Gotham, it was a giant building, rivaling that of the Wayne Enterprises building, with seventy floors and a hundred different department heads, it would be a rival company had Powers not acquired it after it opened.

Boyle sat down on his oak desk, various picture frames sat so the contents were facing Boyle's swivel chair, a laptop sat in the middle of the table under what a appeared to be a thin layer of glass.

Damian straightened his red tie, when he finished dressing his mom told him he looked just like his father, dark brown hair was slicked back, a white shirt sat under his black jacket, along with a set of black pants and loafers, he looked business man like, but also as a prowler ready to gather the information he needed from Boyle, should the situation arise.

"I wanted to apologize for what happened last month." Damian sat down and looked at Boyle "I guess I was just a little too over sensitive because Fries did me a favor."

"Yes, I heard about Mrs. Queen, it's a good thing Fries got to her when he did, good thing Black Mask is going to prison." Boyle walked from the table and looked out the window, a disturbed look on his face

"Everything okay Ferris?"

"No," He took a sigh and rubbed his temples "look, don't tell Powers, I hate to see him have to pull the plug on another employee for incompetence, someone has been robbing WayneCorp buildings."

"What were they taking?"

"How the hell should I know?" Boyle snapped "I'm no scientist; all I know is that they are worth a lot of money…my money."

"I think I understand." Damian's eyes narrowed

"Do you? The technology stolen within the first week put me out of a hundred million, now all this other stuff is at least double...no...triple that."

"Did you file a report with the police?"

"You bet I did, turns out it won't be looked at until they get their heads out of their asses and stop chasing the Batman."

Damian kept his composure as he watched Boyle talk, determination not to let Boyle intimidate him, it was time to pull out the charm his dad taught him during training, though his mom did teach him a few things as well.

"Do you have any leads?"

"No, the only person who I could think would pull some load of horse crap like this is buried six feet underground in an unmarked grave."

Damian felt his cellphone vibrate and beep "Excuse me Ferris, I have to check this, could be the hospital."

He stood and turned his phone on; a text from Victoria warmed his heart, something she always did have a tendency to do.

_Roommate left this morning and the doctor's said I should be able to do something's like move around, no Lady Arrow business yet, but if you wanted to…reconnect, I'm just laying here waiting and begging for my strong man to come and get me._

Damian's cheeks flushed when he saw the attached picture, he never knew Victoria was into seduction over the phone, it was a picture of her laying on her bed though not in her gown, a dark green tank top and black yoga pants, her hair was wrapped up in a bun, the casual look sent chills up Damian's spine. She would definitely kill him for over dressing like this.

"Excuse me Ferris." He turned "That was Mrs. Queen's doctor; they want to run some paperwork by me."

"Of course, send her my best. Her father is a good man."

Damian opened the door and not letting Boyle see him, wipe the sweat that was forming on his brow "With pleasure."

* * *

The door to Tori's room opened and Damian walked inside closing the door behind him, she looked up at him and smiled wickedly at him, her body was positioned so Damian got a full view of every curve and muscle in her body, his face was heavily red.

"You're trying to torture me aren't you?"

She smirked and motioned with her index finger for him to come forward "Maybe I just missed you too much."

"Well," he sat down on the bed toward her feet and gently set his jacket down in front "here I am."

"Good, hate to think this is another dream."

He leaned in close and planted his lips against hers; the bed creaked as she held a hand to his right cheek, feeling a bit of the scruff on his face touching her lips.

She giggled against his lips as her hands moved to take his tie off "You know that tickles right?"

He pulled away "I can go shave."

Tori reached a hand to the back of his neck and pulled him back to her lips "No, I like it."

As they continued to kiss each other, her body had moved as Damian straddled her, Tori's fingers removing the buttons from his shirt, multitasking was not one of her strong suits he could tell as she was having trouble concentrating on getting his shirt open. She sighed in pleasure as Damian's lips moved to her neck, gently laying a trail of kisses up toward her ear lobe and going down toward her collar bone, she couldn't take it and ripped his shirt open and gently removed it, leaving his upper body exposed.

_Don't look at his abs…don't look at his abs…don't…hmmm…._

Damian could only smile as he caught where her eyes were, staring straight at his abs; he gently scratched the back of her neck.

"Your Achilles' heel huh?" Damian smirked

"shut up." She smiled up at him pulling him into another kiss

As her hands began to go to the belt holding his pants in place, people yelling outside caught his attention, Damian lifted his head and heard one person giving out orders.

"Alright, move her in and get her situated, don't let her slip again." A doctor yelled

"Yes doctor." One of the nurses responded

Damian stood and grabbed his shirt, slipping it on as best as he could, he opened the door and heard Tori whine a bit.

"Damian really? You're really going to leave me like this?"

He looked over at her, her skin was flushed red, sweat was dripping down her brow, and her legs were spread open slightly, a look of desperation on her face.

"Give me a minute." He stepped outside

As one of the nurses ran by, he quickly caught up "Nurse, what's going on? Who was admitted?"

The nurse checked her chart "Selina Kyle."

Damian's eyes went wide; he poked his head back inside "Two minutes." Turning back to the nurse "Why was she admitted?"

"She was admitted with a high fever and had fallen in the home she was in. The nine one one call was made by a…John Blake."

Damian's eyes began to tear, he was just with his mother that morning and now Blake was admitting her into the hospital. Maybe it was because of the transition of air, she had been living in Italy for the past quarter of a century so maybe the Gotham air had gotten to her, though if that were the case, it would have gotten to him as well, or maybe…maybe Blake did something that caused his mom to become hurt, he wouldn't be surprised, not with the way they were glaring at each other.

"Can I go and see her?"

"She's not awake and we're not allowing visitors until she is diagnosed, I'm sorry Mister Wayne."

"Look," his tone grew bitter "I'm her son, all I want to do is see my mother for the first time in five months, so please let me go."

"Fine, but the doctor will tell you the same thing I told you."

"Yeah, whatever."

He poked his head into Tori's room again "Five minutes."

"What?"

"Just give me five minutes and then we'll pick up where we left off."

* * *

The heart monitor beeped constantly as Damian walked inside, an elderly woman examined her charts, Damian instantly recognized her.

"Doctor Leslie Tompkins." He smirked

Leslie was a woman in her mid-seventies with short graying hair, a white coat over a brown sweater, blue jeans and shoes, she was still fit and best of all, and she was Alfred's wife and a good friend of his family's.

"Damian Wayne, you're looking well." Leslie turned to him "I'm sorry about Selina; she was such a good child, even after she broke out of prison."

"What does she have?"

"Best I can tell it's a mild fever, but based on her charts, it's something worse." She held them up "They just came from the ER and apparently…she has McGregor Syndrome."

His eyes went wide and the tears slowly began to fall down, he sat down next to his mom, her brown locks were cut short and her bangs were swept over her forehead, oxygen tubes in her nose, an IV was attached to her arm, her index finger held the clamp for her heart monitor.

There was a time when she would have done anything for him to be safe, but now…now he couldn't do it for her.

* * *

_Eight years prior…_

Damian walked off the steps of Starling City High School, diploma in his hand and his gown and cap still on his head, graduating was one thing he was so happy about and he hoped his parents could make it.

"Damian!"

He looked over to Selina standing under a tree, wearing a black top under a purple coat, purple skirt, gloves on her hands, black stockings and a set of high heels, her long brown locks were wrapped up in a bun. Bruce stood beside her, a pair of sunglasses over his eyes and a baseball cap on his head, blue jeans and a black jacket over his dark blue polo.

Damian ran over and pulled both of his parent's into a tight hug, being apart of Starling Cities class was weird, he would have rather been in Gotham High's class, but there was a benefit, and right now, she was talking to her parents about graduating, Bruce smiled as he looked at Oliver Queen and Laurel Lance.

"I am proud of you kiddo." Bruce smiled as he hugged his son

"Does this mean we can go training this summer Dad? You promised."

"We'll see how my back is, if its good enough, we'll leave by the fourth."

Damian's smile turned into a grin as he hugged Selina next, tears ran down her face and her make up slightly stained her face "I'm proud of you Dami."

"Thanks Mom." Damian looked up at his mom

She smiled "Now you see why we wanted you to come here?"

"To keep me safe and away from the criminals in Gotham."

She smirked "One day you'll go back there, and when you do, you'll be on your own."

* * *

She once said that to him and now he felt like the only thing he could do is slip on his cowl and hide away, he wanted to just run and not look back.

"There's nothing more we can do Damian. She has stage one McGregor Syndrome and best we can tell…Selina will be gone by Christmas."

"There is a cure…" he whispered

"What?"

"There is a cure, someone made a cure."

"Then go find them. Bring them here so we can save her."

Damian stood and wiped the tears away "I…I can't…" he bit his lip "He's in a tomb six feet underground."

"Then…then she's doomed."

"No!" He shouted "I'll save her."

Damian looked down at his mom, he wished his dad was here, he would know what to do, what Batman would do.

"But if I'm going to do this, I'm going to need some help."

**Alright, sorry for the delay, work had me going two weeks straight with no break so I hardly had time to think, now things will be slowing down so expect eighteen up soon! And just to warn you now, this story was inspired by the terrible Batman move Batman & Robin, just Mr. Freeze only, so expect some things to be similar and a lot to be different (A few ice puns I promise, not over the top).**

**Stay cool and I'll update soon!**


	18. Chapter 18: Wrath of Freeze Part 1

The metal poles clanged against each other, Damian and Blake kept with equal pace of each other, and their moves matched each other perfectly, though Damian could tell Blake was trying to change up his game.

The younger vigilante swung and Blake dipped his upper body back long enough to dodge it, as Damian recoiled; Blake slammed one of the metal rods into Damian's lower back.

"Keep your focus Damian." Blake bellowed

"Alright, let's do it." Damian rolled his wrists and they began again

Their moves were perfect, almost like fighting a mirror, but Blake changed up his tactics and slammed his hand into Damian's jawline.

"Keep up your focus, your enemy moves like you do, change it up, don't let him surprise you."

Damian gave a low growl and swung forward, losing control, the last few days had been just torture, watching Selina slowly die in the hospital, trying to maintain his relationship with Victoria and be Batman all at the same time, the good news was that with Black Mask locked up in Arkham Asylum, Batman was only on night patrol every other day, instead of every day.

Blake sighed and dipped his entire upper body as Damian attempted to get into a face shot; Blake slammed one of the poles behind Damian's knee cap which sent him to the ground.

"Don't let your anger get the better of you." Blake reminded moving the rods into one hand "How many times do I have to tell you that?"

"Yeah, yeah, sorry if I'm a bit worried about everything going on." Damian stood "Not every day my mom and girlfriend are in the hospital."

"Doesn't Victoria get released today?"

He nodded "Yeah, in a few hours."

Blake's feet took him to the Batcomputer where it was loudly beeping with an alert; he tapped a few keys and read the report.

"Looks like you may not be able to meet her." Blake looked at Damian "That radio you took from the GCPD has come to good use; someone broke into the Gotham Museum."

"Why the museum?"

"I don't know, the criminal is looking for something. Stop him."

* * *

"Stop right there or we'll shoot!"

His body moved with heavy steps, his body encased in heavy black armor, tubes attaching to points along his stomach began to glow a bright white, small sections of his upper arms began to glow a bright white, a glass bowl encased his head and red goggles surrounded his eyes.

Bullets began to fire and bounced against his armor, the cops began to look on in fear as the new figure pressed a button on the small gun which had tubes attached to the suit, he aimed and fired, a jet of white fired from the gun and struck one of the cops, after several seconds, the cop was frozen in place.

As his associates looked at their frozen comrade, they were caught off guard as the target grabbed the second cop by the throat; his throat felt crushed and slumped to the ground with a broken neck.

With a snap of the target's fingers, two of his associates, dressed in a white fur coat, sunglasses and black boots grabbed ahold of the final cop.

"Please, show some mercy!" The cop begged

"Mercy?" The target bellowed in challenge "I'm afraid," His gun began to charge and the associates backed off "my condition has left me cold, to your pleas of mercy."

With a click of the trigger, the gun fired another burst of white and froze the final cop, a smug smile spread on the attacker's face as he turned to his target, a series of diamonds held behind glass.

He moved toward it, his boots adding an additional shock to the ground as he raised a fist and slammed it into the glass and retrieved the diamonds in his hands.

"We have what we came for. Move out…"

As he turned to his men, they were on the ground knocked out, Batman bent down and slammed the final mercenary's head into the ground; he stood and looked at him.

"And now what should we call you? Ice man? The Snowman?"

The attacker charged his gun "Mr. Freeze."

Batman's eyes went wide as the gun fired, he immediately jumped out of the way and threw a batarang at Freeze, who fired his gun again at the batarang, which froze and broke into a million pieces.

The Dark Knight knew he had to act fast, if not, he was going to lose this fight.

* * *

Victoria Queen stood outside the hospital, she checked her cell phone again and Damian was late, it wasn't like him, though she did remember what he told her when she first woke up.

_When you get out of here. meet me at the Palacades, Thomas and Martha memorial boys home, go inside, find the piano, press three keys, when the book shelf opens, go inside._

She still didn't understand what that meant, what did a boy's home have to do with what he wanted to tell her? Maybe it was that he planned on reopening the home, or maybe he was going to work it so he could move into Wayne Manor, or was it something else?

A car pulled up and her smile brightened as she approached "Damian, what…"

Blake sat inside the driver's seat, a determined look on his face "Get inside Mrs. Queen, we need to talk."

"Where's Damian? He's supposed to meet me."

"He sent me Mrs. Queen." Blake smiled "I'm his head of security."

"Is everything okay?"

"Yes, but right now, I need you just to come with me."

* * *

Batman dodged another shot from the freeze gun and dove into a corner hiding.

"Oracle, I need help with this, I don't think I can take him." Batman growled "I can't get close enough."

"_Give me a few minutes and I'll get it figured out. Blake has Victoria."_

"What!? Why?"

"_He's going to tell her what's going on, since you're not here."_

"I'll get back as soon as I can. I just…"

The sound of a gun click interrupted his conversation as Freeze stood over him, a smile spread on his face "Now your time to freeze has come Batman."

Batman growled and sent a set of kicks into Freeze's chest, then slammed a fist into the glass, Freeze got temporarily distracted and with that amount of time, Batman managed to slip away, he clicked a button on his belt and the lights went dead.

He blended in with the shadows as the glowing from Freeze's suit gave him away, Batman used this to quietly move away, his training from Selina taught him to blend in with the shadows and not to let the enemy hear him, though something gave him away, he just needed to figure it out.

"You cannot hide from me Batman, I know exactly where you are."

_Not for long._

He drew his grapple gun and fired upwards, luckily the museum had two floors to this section, he allowed it to pull him up and he disappeared from sight.

_Damian, I have some things to tell you._

"Go ahead Oracle." Batman whispered

_Okay, first, Victoria and Blake are almost here, second I figured out where that suit came from. Its WayneCorp technology, it was stolen early last month._

"And the rest of it? What does he need diamonds for?"

"_I don't know, still trying to figure that one out, but that suit was originally meant for finding terrorists in artic conditions like on Mount Everest, it can track targets by heat signatures from their feet."_

"Their feet?" Batman looked down at his boots "Well, this definitely isn't good. Any weaknesses you can find?"

"_Still working on that, Boyle has online security heavier than the actual building, but nothing I can't handle, give me some time."_

The lights turned on again and Freeze pointed his gun at Batman "Hurry up Oracle; I don't think I have much time left."

He leapt off the second floor and flew downwards toward Freeze, his body straightened and he flipped around, raising his feet, he slammed them into Freeze's chest, which sent him backwards, Batman leapt forward and slammed his fist into the glass, then sent a series of cobra strikes into Freeze's chest, his suit activated and sent a pulse which sent Batman backwards and onto his back, Freeze stood up and grabbed Batman by the throat.

"My suit also increases my strength three fold Batman, you don't stand a chance."

"Maybe, but I still have back up." Batman grunted as he slammed a fist into Freeze's bowl

Freeze smiled behind his glass bowl "Prepare to die…"

He walked over to the wall and slammed Batman into the wall and aimed his gun and prepared to fire, Batman tried to react, he kicked the gun out of Freeze's hand, the wire disconnected and the gun flew a few feet away.

As Freeze slammed a fist into Batman's stomach, he roared in pain as Freeze walked over and grabbed his gun aimed and fired his gun at Batman.

* * *

Blake pulled the car to the front of the manor, Victoria looked at him "Blake, why are we here?"

"Everything will be explained soon enough." Blake got out of the car

He gently opened the door for her and helped Victoria out, he walked her into the manor, Victoria looked around at the various items covered in sheets, but she knew following him would be the easier part.

Blake pressed a few keys on the piano and the library door slid open, revealing an elevator, Tori looked surprised as he motioned for her to follow to which she silently did.

The door in front of them closed and the elevator slowly descended downwards.

"Blake…where are we going?"

"Your questions will be answered."

The door opened and Tori took in the sight of the Batcave, her eyes were wide as she looked around and she wondered what was going on, and where was Damian?

"Barbara! It's time."

"Batman? Batman? Respond." Barbara didn't hear Blake as she tapped the earphone on her right ear "Damian, come on pick up."

"Damian?" Tori asked

Oracle turned to Victoria Queen standing along with Blake "Oh no."

"Is he okay?" Blake asked

Barbara shook her head, moving her red hair away from her face "I…I don't know."

**Alright, two chapters in a row are up and running! With me having the morning off, I decided to try and bang this out, nineteen will be up this week, I want to try and finish this as fast as I can so I can move onto the next one.**


	19. Chapter 19: Wrath of Freeze Part 2

"What the hell is going on here? Where is Damian?" Victoria demanded

"Tori, just calm down," Barbara went to the screen "Damian foresaw this."

"Is he Batman? You tell me right now!" She shouted to both Oracle and Blake

"I think he'll have to show you." Barbara pressed a button

The screen she was looking at came to life and Damian stat in front of it, a calm look on his face.

"_Is it on? Are you sure Barbara?" Damian asked_

"_Yes Damian, go on ahead." _

"_Alright," he looked at the screen "hey Tori, I know you more than likely found all this, I was going to meet you when you got here, but something just caught my attention and I'm being called out. I guess I have some explaining to do, there's a reason why Batman has been fighting so hard against Black Mask, there's a reason why I was fighting to protect you. In case you haven't figured it out already…I am the Batman." _

Tori looked at him, tears building up in her eyes as she cupped her chin in her hand, her other hand gripped her arm.

"_I didn't tell you for a reason, I didn't…because I love you, I've always loved you, ever since high school I've had a feeling for you that's strong enough that I almost can't stand not to be with you."_

Tori felt the tears begin to flow down her face, she couldn't believe how different he seemed, even in his voice he was so determined and so truthful.

"_And I've known about you as well, ever since your dad told me about what happened between after Roman captured you. I knew about your identity as Lady Arrow, and I have to say, you have a good track record….by now, if I haven't returned, it means I've been captured or injured with no help, so I'm going to need you, I know your costume was modified so you could become the Black Rose, but I have something that you might like to see." _

At that, a platform rose up from where Damian would normally keep his suit, it slowly opened and Tori smiled at what she saw.

"_The suit has pieces taken from Wayne Enterprises, so you can't be connected to Starling City because this…is the new Lady Arrow."_

* * *

Batman slowly opened his eyes, his entire body felt frozen, almost like he had stepped into a giant freezer, upon further inspection, he found he was hanging upside down, with his boots being encased in ice while his arms were bound by a sheet of ice by his wrists and his utility belt was shattered to pieces.

"Do not attempt to break free Batman, you'll find you are quite frozen in place."

There stood Mr. Freeze on an ice built throne, beside him was a table also made of ice with a small cylinder made of glass sitting on it, inside was a woman who appeared to be a ballerina, it slowly rotated on a circle.

Batman glared as Freeze stood from his place and approached him, a sinister look on his face.

"Mind telling me who you are?" Batman asked

"You already know, we met once before."

Batman thought for a moment, and then it dawned on him "Victor Fries."

"That name means nothing to me anymore."

"I was there…I saved Nora."

"No, no you didn't." Freeze glared at him "You simply saved her and bought her a few precious hours."

"What happened? I stabilized her."

"You do not deserve to know what happened but I will tell you anyway."

* * *

_One month before…_

_Victor Fries sprung up with a series of heavy breaths, he felt like he had just woken up from a really bad nightmare, something about Boyle and Nora dying and an explosion. He was lying on a metal bed, a gown wrapped around his body_

_As he set his hands on the table, he found that he didn't feel the normal cool temperature of the solid steel table, he lifted his hands and tried again, but still nothing, what was going on?_

"_Relax Doctor Fries, you are still alive." _

_Fries turned, the room he was in was a heavily encased room, the doors were bolted shut, speakers were in the corners of the room and a TV came to life, showing an elderly man in his early sixties with snow white hair, tan skin and a tired look in his eyes and he walked with a cane._

"_Who are you? How do you know you I am!?" Fries questioned_

"_Relax, my name is Grant Walker, I'm someone of interest to you Mr. Fries."_

"_Where is my wife? Where is Nora?"_

"_She died in the explosion, it was a choice; we could either save the patient, or save the doctor who created the cure McGregor Syndrome." _

"_Nora!" Fries called out as he fell to his knees_

"_I know you're angry, but how about you channel your anger at something….or someone else."_

"_What do you mean?" Fries asked coldly_

* * *

"_I can give you the equipment necessary to strike back against WayneCorp and show them the true cold feeling of revenge."_

_Fries finished strapping on the last piece of armor and looked at him hardly even recognizing himself in the mirror as Walker approached._

"_You'll find the suit increases your strength three fold and you will be able to survive in subzero temperatures, the goggles can scan for heat signatures and even the freeze gun works."_

_Fries felt his suit spark to life, the tubes attached to his chest and the gun slowly began to glow a bright white, his goggles inverted revealing infrared vision, he primed the gun at a nearby wall and fired, a jet of white streamed from the gun and made impact on the wall, turning it from a solid structure into a block of ice._

"_See, now we can use it on WayneCorp and then we can move onto the rest of the world. With you at my side, Oceana will become the dominate way of life in Gotham."_

_Fries glared at Walker "You intend to use me to build your little life you have built down here? I do not think so; you took Nora away, now I will take you away from this world."_

_Walker slowly began to back away as Fries approached, terror spread on his face as Fries grabbed him by the collar._

"_Please! Show me mercy! I have a family! My wife is suffering the same as Nora!"_

"_"It would move me to tears... If I still had tears to shed."_

_The sound of Walker's neck breaking in two echoed through the halls of Oceana._

* * *

"My god…Victor…I'm sorry about Nora."

"Save it. I do not want any form of compassion from her true murderer."

"But you know Boyle did it, why not spare me and go after him instead?" Batman questioned

"You both are," Freeze primed his gun "once I'm done with you, I will be moving onto Mister Ferris Boyle, then after Boyle, all of Gotham will know the feeling I have."

"And that would be…?"

"Think of it Batman….to never again walk on a summer's day with a hot wind in your face and a warm hand to hold. I'd kill to feel that again."

Batman could only glare at Freeze _I think my hands are going numb here._

"Now." Freeze backed a few feet and primed his gun so the barrel was pointing at Batman's head "Let me show you what…"

He was interrupted by something flying fast toward Batman's feet, within an instant the ice at his feet began to melt and he felt a warm feeling come to them as he felt himself drop to the ground, then with one motion, he used all of his strength to break the hold on his hands.

"How did you..."

Another object flew by and struck at Victor's feet, as Freeze drew it from the snow, it was nothing more than an arrow with what appeared to be a small object attached to it, with a snap it exploded, letting a warmth spread on Freeze's body, within seconds, his suit reactivated, though Batman could see how much pain it caused him, even though it was only for a minute.

"Victor Fries!" A figure called out

Freeze and Batman turned to the new figure arriving on the scene, wearing a black long sleeved top over a green sleeveless jacket with black stripes, golden shoulder pads with gold lines going from her shoulders to the middle of her chest, black pants, a quiver over her back, bow in hand, black fingerless gloves over her hands with metal studs on the knuckles, black boots with green stripes going up to her calf, her blonde hair was tied back in a ponytail and a domino mask was over her eyes.

She stood in front of Batman and primed another arrow, ready to fire. Batman took a spot next to her "Surprised?"

"We'll talk about it later." She primed another arrow "I'm not all too happy Batman."

"You'll be even unhappy with this." Freeze fired a burst straight at her

Batman jumped in front and took the shot clear to the chest, his body moving backwards and he slammed into the wall, he could feel his armor begin to crack as he slumped to the ground.

"You have a choice to make my dear," Freeze fired his gun at the wall, which broke

Revealed inside was a large tank like vehicle painted white, crystals jetted out of the front with a giant gun in front, a full windshield was in the front.

"Save the Bat, or pursue me. Your choice." Freeze pressed a button on his belt

The hatch on the top of the van opened and he climbed inside, as Lady Arrow glared at him, she ran toward Batman, causing Freeze to back out slowly, but not before she went to her wrist where several smaller arrows were situated, he removed one and fired it, the arrow soared and made impact on the back of the Freezemobile, it began to change from the original black to now the same color as the car, blinking red.

"Batman, come on, wake up!" She pleaded as she got down on her knees

Batman didn't move at all, she knew she had to see, she still didn't believe John and Barbara but she had to see it, she didn't believe it. Her hands went to the graphite cowl, her fingers gently went to the seals and clicked them open, her hands gripped the sides of his cowl and lifted it up, she almost shrieked when she saw Damian's head, his face bloodied and his body was shaking.

"Damian? Damian, come on wake up."

His eyes slowly opened and he looked at her, a weak smile spread on his face as he lifted a hand and cupped her cheek, his armor continued to crack "Take care of my mother."

Damian's hand dropped and his eyes closed, Victoria felt the tears go down her face as she pressed her fingers to her ear "John, we need help. Now!"

**A little bit of suspense for the end of the chapter, I honestly am loving what I have planned with Mr. Freeze, so just stay tuned for chapter 20!**


	20. Chapter 20: A new plan

_He felt like he was dead, he didn't feel anything, nothing was bothering him, nothing was hurting him and he finally felt free._

"_Damian…wake up! For me!"_

_A familiar voice entered his ears, he recognized it, Victoria was calling him, and she sounded worried, he needed to be strong, he remembered everything. Flashes entered his vision, his parents raising him, training with his father, his mother on her deathbed, kissing Victoria Queen on the lips and finally the symbol of the bat. He knew what he had to do. He was still alive, and he still had a fight to win._

* * *

"Cycle complete, he's coming out!" Barbara called out

A platform was risen by the Batcomputer and it was a giant container with a red liquid filled inside and Damian was strapped inside, a breath mask over his face and he began to stir, the liquid began to drain from the container into a series of tubes and the door opened, Damian's eyes snapped open and he fell to the ground, the mask ripping off of his face and bounced inside the cell.

He couldn't catch his breath as his eyes snapped open, Barbara smiled at him, though she was the only one he could see, as his vision began to clear, Damian saw John over by the different suits, with each case risen up, from what he could tell, Blake was looking at his suit.

As he began to stand, his skin and body began to sting, Barbara rolled over with a chair "Sit and relax okay?"

Damian nodded and began to control his breath "How long have I been out?"

"Three days in a chemical bath took care of it," Barbara smiled "everyone's been worried sick. Plus, we got a call."

"From who?"

"Bruce Wayne, he's coming into Gotham with Maria to see your mom." Barbara replied

Damian frowned, he knew his father would be a mess, let alone…his worst fear may come true.

"Barbara, lock down the Batcave, don't let my father in here."

Blake looked over "You don't think what I think you're thinking are you?"

"He comes back, Mom's sick about to die and Freeze is the only one with a cure? Yeah, he'd do whatever it would take to make sure that cure is set. We need to do it ourselves." Damian leaned forward and rested his elbows on his knees

"What do you have in mind?"

"We need to find Nora, Walker wouldn't want to have Freeze as a loose cannon," he leaned back, letting his back hit the chair "Nora would be the only leverage to ensure Freeze did what Walker wanted."

"And now Walker's dead." Barbara remarked

"Oracle, check to see if Oceana is still active." Damian stood up

He slipped on a pair of jeans and a black polo and walked toward the waterfall where Victoria was standing looking out, she was standing in the water, looking out at the falls, and he walked over to her and gently wrapped an arm around her waist.

"You've been quiet." Damian smiled

She didn't change her motion or her face "Just don't really have anything to say. Figured you, Blake and Barbara had things covered."

"Look, I know that I'll need your help." Damian smiled "Besides, gives us more time to spend together."

"Even though we'll be working handsome?" She let her body hit his chest

"You know it." His fingers gently went through her blonde hair

She took a breath in and felt it hitch when his fingers touched her hair "I was so worried about you."

"Well, I'm here and soon you and I will be back in the field together." Damian smirked as he planted a kiss on her neck

Victoria leaned gently into him, her head turned as he wiped her hair away so he could look into her beautiful green eyes, they let their lips get closer together, as they were about connect, a clearing of a throat interrupted them.

Damian looked over annoyed at Blake "If you two are quite done, you're not going back into the field yet Mister Wayne, come take a look."

* * *

"Fox failed to mention that this suit does not do well against extremely cold temperatures, if you go back out in this suit again….you're going to die."

"I don't have another choice." Damian looked down at his bat suit "I have to use it."

"No, no you don't, we need to find something else for you to be safe." Tori looked at him

"Whatever choice do I have?" Damian looked at her "The suit is just going to need some sealing along the cracks, but once this is done, Fox is going to look into another suit for me, this one is too bulky anyway."

"Well, I have good news and bad news!" Barbara announced

"Hit me Oracle."

"Good news, Oceana is alive, bad news, I can't get access to the security cameras."

"So, we have to deal with a base with no form of back up." Damian shook his head "What of Nora?"

"Well, she's not in WayneCorp, so more than likely Walker or Boyle."

"Then I think it's time I pay Mister Boyle a little visit." Damian smirked "Also, take a look into Paxton Powers, see if he's involved in this."

"Damian, I'm not confident with you using that suit, but I have a great idea." Blake smirked

A platform in the back of the room began to rise and Damian's smirk grew wider.

* * *

Ferris Boyle shut the light off in his room, it was time for him to go home and get some dinner in his stomach.

A beep came from his phone in his office as he grabbed his jacket, he walked to the phone and picked it up "Yes Lucy? Does Paxton need something?"

"_Mister Boyle, I wanted to remind you that you have a meeting with Mister Powers in the morning at nine, you are needed to go over the information regarding the missing pieces of WayneCorp equipment."_

Boyle turned on his light and began to sift through his files "Yes, I have everything ready, thank you for reminding me."

As Boyle was prepared to turn the phone off the lights went out and something shot at his hand and sent the phone down to the ground, as he bent down, he picked up a golden shuriken shaped like a bat.

"Oh no, oh no," Boyle smirked "this should be…"

His sentence was interrupted by a foot slamming into his stomach, as Boyle was sent backwards; the figure grabbed him by the throat and slammed him into the wall.

"Hello Ferris." Batman growled

The moonlight revealed Batman; he was in a black Kevlar plate armor, bat suit was held within the plates, black cape hung down to his legs and the high collar hung around his neck.

"Well, well, new suit? Not like your current one." Boyle sneered

"You are going to tell me where Nora Fries is and you are going to tell me right now."

"She's dead…" This was met with Batman tighten his grip

"You're lying to me Boyle." Batman growled "Now, tell me, where Nora Fries is."

"I don't know!" Boyle yelled trying to breathe, Batman let go and he slumped to the ground "I was told to leave her and someone would pick her up."

"Who?"

"Black Mask!"

Batman's eyes went wide "That's impossible, he's in Arkham."

"I don't know how, all I was told was that I needed to leave Nora in Fries' lab and they would take care of it."

"You fool, is Paxton apart of his…"

"Yes, he's been on Sionis' payroll since he first took control."

"Thank you." Boyle was met with a swift punch in the side of his head, knocking him out "That's for Fries."

* * *

The door to Selina's hospital room opened and Damian walked inside, he smiled when he saw Selina, she wasn't up and running, but she was awake and she was reading one of her books, he was just happy she was up.

Selina looked up from her book "Hey kiddo."

"Hey," He sat down on the edge of her bed "how are you feeling?"

"Better, all things considering, Thompkins told me I was dying." She said grimly

"You have McGregor Syndrome Mom; no one's found a cure."

"From what I heard," she set her book down and leaned back "You found someone who made a cure."

"Only problem, he's dead."

"Not from what your friend the boy in blue told me." Selina smirked "He stopped by to check in on me, told me about Mr. Freeze and how you almost died."

Damian frowned "Yeah, he almost killed me."

"Hmm, your father won't be too happy with that one." Selina smirked

"You know Dad and Maria are coming here?"

"To Gotham?"

He nodded simply.

"Great, that's just what I need. Your father gawking over me while I die." She quickly coughed as she finished her sentence

"Mom, just relax okay?"

The door opened and Thompkins walked in "Afternoon Selina. Hello Damian."

"Grandma Leslie." Damian smiled

"So, tell me Doc, how long do I have?"

"Best I can say, until Christmas, which is only a few days away…I'm sorry Selina."

Damian looked at his mom, a worried and fearful look on her face, something he had never seen from her before, she always was a woman with a high amount of confidence and strength, to see her fearful, it would be a bad thing.

"Mom, I'll find that cure." Damian stood, kissed his mom on the side of her head and walked out, tears going down his eyes

* * *

"Alright, so I managed to find out what Freeze is planning to do with those parts."

Barbara began to type a few keys on her keyboard and the pictures of the parts came up, one represented a cannon like shape, another was a series of domes and finally one that represented a generator.

"Now look what happens if you combine each part together."

She pressed a key and the pictures began to merge together, the domes sat on the ground, the cannon stuck out, a circular part held the cannon in place and the generator was placed behind the chair.

"It forms a cannon."

"One that could be capable to fire an extreme amount of cold at a specific target."

"He's going to target Gotham." Damian frowned

"You know what you have to do right?"

"Yup, but I'll need help." Damian went to his old Batsuit "Tell Tori I'll need her in the raptor, I need you to find Nora, and tell Blake to text Jim and give him Nora Fries, as well as the information on Boyle and Powers."

"What are you going to do?"

"Going to Oceana." Damian began to pick up his suit

**Twenty is up and running! We're descending into the end here, this next part will be three parts which should be done this week assuming things go well personally and writing wise, there will be three chapters after that, so we're looking at about twenty-six to twenty-seven chapters for this story then book two won't be up for awhile yet, so for now, I hope everyone enjoys and stay tuned for what is to come!**


	21. Chapter 21: Subzero Part 1

The Oceana entrance was a large boat with what appeared to be a dive bell attached to a thick wire, from above, two figures took in the view as the snow began to fall from the sky.

"So, what's the plan? We go in and commit full attack?" Lady Arrow whispered

Batman lowered his binoculars from his eyes "Seems like a suicide mission, there's no way we're both going in there."

"What?" She almost screamed "You want to go in there yourself?"

"If I fall, then you can come in and do the finishing blow." Batman growled "I need you to coordinate with Oracle to find Nora Fries, if we plan on calming down the walking snowman, we'll need her."

"Damian…"

"Tori, I'm not going to debate on this. I need you to find Nora." Batman stood

Lady Arrow stood up and looked up at him, a look of concern in her eyes, Batman could only smile and stroke her cheek.

"I'll be fine, this suit can get one more battle out of it, besides, and I got a bit more of a plan this time."

"And how do you intend to survive?"

"Simple." Batman stood "Endure…listen Tori, incase this doesn't…"

"Don't say that." She stood and cupped his covered cheeks in her hands

"Please, just make sure my mom is okay."

Lady Arrow nodded quietly as she walked off, leaving Batman alone.

* * *

Getting into Oceana was easy; no security on the outside, but everything was covered in a thick sheet of ice, from the windows giving off the view of the ocean, to the floors and the dome like roof, if Freeze had created a fortress, this would definitely be the place to make one.

He calmly walked down a small step platform into what he believed was the central chamber of the amusement park, a series of buildings were on the outside, almost they were nothing more but illusions, in the center stood a metal disk with a large TV in the background.

Batman silently stepped closer to the disk and tapped his ear "Oracle, I need the details on this…"

The screen lit with life and Freeze's face appeared with a bright light "_Hello Batman_."

"I'll call you back." He removed his fingers "Freeze, where are you? We need to talk."

"_I know we do Batman, step on the platform and I'll meet you there."_

Batman looked down at the disk and raised his left foot, the disk felt cold against his boots, he decided to take the plunge and stepped on, his cape draping over his shoulders, with a large hiss the disk began to descend down the narrow tube it was built on.

* * *

Lady Arrow drove on the Batpod, she was grateful Damian let her use it while he used the RAPTOR, still, trying to find Nora Fries in such a big city like Gotham was going to be more difficult than she thought.

"Barbara, any thoughts?"

"_Hang on; I got the serial number on Fries' cryotube, tracking its location now."_

Tori nodded and pressed on the break; the Batpod slid up a building, hung in midair for a split second and rotated, placing its front in the way Lady Arrow just arrived from.

"_Got it, the tracking number was traced to the Falcone shipping yards."_

"I'm on it." Victoria smiled as she started up the engine of the motorcycle

Her target was well guarded, Nora Fries' body was still in the cryotube, but it was guarded by many of Black Mask's thugs, they carried M4 rifles and their masks were worn on their faces, Tori sneered and drew her bow.

She primed an arrow and fired, landing on the ground between the men, they looked up and she leapt into the fray and went on the offensive, using her bow as a club and slammed it into their bodies and ducked as bullets began to fly, she primed an arrow with lighting fast speed and fired, slamming it into the shoulder of one of the mercenaries, then using her father's reflexes she kept striking, knocking each one down one at a time.

There was one left, he primed his gun but she went on the offensive, she performed a roundabout kick and sent the rifle flying into the air and landed on the ground a few feet away, he began to back away slowly and she crept up closer and closer until she was able to grab him by the throat.

"Who sent you? Why are you watching her?"

The thug grunted as Tori continued to squeeze harder "I…I don't know! All I was told was to get the frosty bitch away from the snow man!"

"Who?"

"Bla…Black Mask!"

Tori's eyes went wide as she released his throat and slammed a foot into his face, knocking him out. She walked over to Nora and began to check the small screen.

"Hey Barb, any chance you could hack into this thing? I can't make heads or tails of it."

"S_ure, just give me a minute."_

"By the way, you promised Damian and me donuts while we were on stakeout."

"_Really Tori? You're thinking of donuts right now?"_

"What do you want from me? I'm starving."

"_We'll handle it when you get back. I got the computer on my screen, looks like Nora's alive."_

"Great! I'll tell Damian." Tori smiled then her mind reflected back to what the thug told her

Black Mask couldn't be alive…it was impossible.

* * *

_**Four hours earlier**_

An explosion rocked Arkham Island, the entire place was up in flames, prisoners were being evacuated by almost the entire police SWAT force, someone had caused it, but no one could find who.

"Do we have everyone rounded up?" Gordon asked

"Almost all of them." Bullock responded "We're missing Crane, Zasz, Tetch, and Croc."

"What of Black Mask?"

"Sionis' body was found by suicide, he hung himself right before the explosions, but here's the funny thing Jimmy." Bullock looked at his partner "His mask was gone, and a large number of his men were pulled out on parole."

Gordon sighed as he glanced to his side; his eyes went wide when he saw what appeared to be Batman standing off to the side.

"I'll be right back Harvey, do a body count again." Gordon walked off

As he dipped into the side, Batman immediately stood his ground "Seems like you always know where to find us."

"Nothing more than following the flashing lights."

Gordon smirked "Well, I'm glad you're here, we can't make heads or tails of this. We don't know if they got lost in the fire and died or they escaped and now we can't find any traces of them."

"I'll look into it." Batman looked at the Asylum "What will become of Arkham Island?"

"We're going to rebuild, we can't keep them in the old building but we can find a means to hold them in Blackgate and what remains of the Asylum."

"You sound concerned."

"You know Commissioner Akins has a new task force set up to bring you down." Gordon sighed

Batman nodded and didn't a word as Lady Arrow watched from the caped crusader. They had gotten the call in the middle of the night and she was still exhausted.

"Well I'll try my best to throw them off, but if they get word…"

"I'll make sure nothing happens."

* * *

Victoria sighed as she clicked on the monitor "Alright Oracle, Nora is secured."

"G_ood job Tori…"_

The signal went dead; Lady Arrow tapped her earpiece "Oracle? Oracle?"

The sound of a safety being removed came from behind her "Get your filthy hands off of that." A raspy, yet familiar voice spoke

Batman dropped down onto the bottom floor, around him, the ground began to shake, from what he could tell, they were rising upwards, from below, he saw him, Victor Freeze was typing away on a computer, a large cannon was mounted in the corner with his men surrounding it.

* * *

"Hello Batman." Freeze spoke gently

"Victor." Batman walked down the stairs "You don't have to do this."

"They took my wife away Batman, Gotham City took everything away from me, the life I once had…"

"Based on nothing but obsession." Batman growled "Your McGregor Syndrome cure, give it to me."

Freeze turned to face him "What makes you think I have it?"

"I know you do, this is not a time for negotiations."

"Oh I think it is, if you want the cure," Freeze clicked a button on his suit

Beside him, a small, rounded cylinder rose, showing three vials of a navy blue liquid in them, Freeze held one in his hand.

"You will have to pry it from my cold, dead hands. You have given me your last order." Freeze slammed his hand into a fist

The vial burst in a million pieces of glass, the blue liquid fell onto the floor. Batman growled and prepared to charge. Freeze primed his gun and aimed it at Batman, he fired and the dark knight flipped back into the stairwell he came from.

"Oracle, Freeze is attacking me. Get me the schematics from Wayne Corp now!" Batman ordered

**Sorry for the lack of updating people, work has been kicking my butt lately, but on a good note, this story is almost done! We're looking at about another four chapters until the ending. Plus I have a big announcement. For all of you DC comic fans who read my work, your in luck, I am planning a Justice League series of books based on the children of the famous members of the League, I'm not telling you whose next yet, but I promise it'll be good!**

**Anyway, stay tuned for future announcements of my series and my sequel to the Coldest Knight which is still being planned.**


	22. Chapter 22: Subzero Part 2

"You will have to pry it from my cold, dead hands. You have given me your last order." Freeze slammed his hand into a fist

The vial burst in a million pieces of glass, the blue liquid fell onto the floor. Batman growled and prepared to charge. Freeze primed his gun and aimed it at Batman, he fired and the dark knight flipped back into the stairwell he came from.

"Oracle, Freeze is attacking me. Get me the schematics from Wayne Corp now!" Batman ordered

"_You got it, just try and avoid him attacking you; this will only take a minute." _

_B_atman jumped out of the way and hid in a corner, he looked out of the corner cover and spotted Freeze…and he was heading right for him. Batman continued to move, not wanting to stop, if he stopped, Freeze would kill him.

The tubes on Freeze's suit began to spark with life, glowing a bright ice blue, he aimed his gun and fired a rounded burst at Batman's location who managed to jump out of the way and threw a batarang at Freeze, another shot and the metal throwing bat froze and broke in a million pieces.

With lighting fast accuracy, the caped crusader drew his grapple gun and aimed at the roof, hitting a button on the side he was quickly throwing upwards and into the shadows of the domed roof.

"_Batman, hope you're ready, I got the schematics." _

Damian gave a sigh of relief as he grabbed onto the metal frame with one gloved hand, the other tapped his ear while he watched Freeze. "Hit me Oracle."

"F_reeze's suit is a former suit used by front line army soldiers, the suit would adapt to any type of situation and any form of damage taken to it."_

"Then it's unbeatable?"

"_Not exactly, while the suit can be adapted, it can't keep up a constant strike of attacks against it, every time it takes eighty percent damage, it reboots itself. The time it takes for this reboot to completely give energy back is longer and longer until…"_

"Until the suit can't charge anymore, anything I use can defeat him?"

"_Pretty much everything, your line launcher, your gun jammer, and just no batarangs." _

"Not to mention the little secret weapon Morgan developed." Batman readjusted his belt

"_Even that one, I would use it last." _

"Tap into the security cameras and get back to me about where the damn cure is. I'm not letting my mom die because of him."

* * *

Selina's vitals began to dim, Leslie looked at Selina Kyle with fear, the young girl she had saved all those years ago and brought to her clinic after her father had finally killed Maria Kyle when she was no older than seven years old was now dying because of a disease that her son knew the only doctor who cured it.

_Come on Damian, hurry up already damn it._

* * *

Bruce Wayne waited outside the hospital, in the back seat his daughter Maria slept soundly, unaware that for the last month her mother had been dying, he was furious with the whole situation, while yes, he was proud of Damian for what he had done in Gotham so far, but he was worried sick for Selina, the woman he had come to love over the years had been through enough, now she had to deal with this.

A knock on the window knocked him out of his thoughts; he lowered down the window and let the cold air enter his SUV "What are you doing here?"

* * *

Batman readied himself, he adjusted his position and glared down at Freeze who was still searching for him, though now a loud noise followed by an arch like blue light, the paint on his armor would stop him, the light was going to scan for any life forms.

"You cannot hide from me forever."

"I don't need to." Batman bellowed "I do my best work in the dark, but now it's time for winter to end."

Batman leapt off the side of the roof and flew downwards using his cape for support, just when he was about a few inches over Freeze, he let himself drop, his feet made impact as Freeze hit the ground hard, a loud beeping echoed through the halls as his suit began to shut down, Batman went on the offensive, landing a few quick cobra punches into Freeze's chest and finally slammed a fist into the center of Freeze's helmet, noticing a small crack forming.

_Rebooting system, rebooting system._

A pulse was sent out of Freeze's suit, knocking Batman off his feet and sliding into the ground, he looked up to Freeze standing up again, his suit glowing, he flexed his hand and closed it into a fist as he primed his Freeze gun. A thick mist began to spread throughout the battlefield originating from the slots in Freeze's suit.

Batman dove out of the way and jumped into cover as Freeze fired again, missing by a narrow inch of Batman's cape. A sigh of relief came from him as he took out his gun jammer.

He jumped out of cover and held his hand behind his back "Freeze! What do you think you're going to do after you kill me?"

"Simple, when I kill you, then I will move onto the rest of Gotham, freezing it over and sentencing the people into an icy grave." Freeze turned to Batman

Batman looked behind him for a split second to see the gun preparing to fire, the lights glowing and the gun beginning to glow the same icy blue as the tubes in Freeze's suit. He pressed the button and heard a beep as Freeze pressed the trigger.

In a hot flash, the gun overloaded and the resulting heat began to fry the controls, Batman took the opportunity to dive forward and tackle Freeze to the ground, he pinned the ice terrorist to the ground and slammed a series of punches into Freeze's face, breaking the glass and slamming a few fists into Freeze's bones.

The suit began to power up again, Batman dove as the pulse exploded out again, Freeze stood up and looked around as he began to turn the power on his gun.

"I learn from my mistakes Batman! Do you!?" Freeze bellowed

Batman sighed, he knew the giant gun was his only hope, he looked out as it prepared to fire, and the barrel of the gun began to spark with life. He began to move silently through the under level of the arena, he drew his sticky launcher out, primed it and fired ahead of him, saying a prayer the bombs landed where they needed to be.

Freeze began to move, his feet were active, but Batman had a plan, he flipped open a compartment of his belt and pressed the button, the lights went out, including the gun temporarily, Freeze's lights were the only source.

"Oh!? You think the darkness will save you from me? I can see your every move Batman!"

"I do my best work in the dark," Batman taunted "You won't find me unless I want you to, which I guarantee you, when you find me, this fight for Gotham's future will be over…and the dawn will take away the ice."

Freeze finally followed his path up a small set of stairs, as he began to move forward, he found his target. He grabbed Batman by the throat and slammed a fist into his stomach, which caused the lights to turn back on.

"Hey Freeze."

Freeze looked at his adversary as Batman removed his belt buckle off and slammed it into Freeze's chest, the bat symbol began to glow red.

"The heat is on." Batman smiled as he kicked Freeze in the groin

The resulting blow caused Freeze to let go long enough for the caped crusader to flip them so Freeze was trapped, as he prepared to move upwards, the bombs timer hit zero and the bombs exploded, sending the gun into overload and causing a series of explosions to rock the arena, Freeze began to receive explosion after explosion, surges of electricity pulsed through his body and the explosions sent Batman flying and hit his head against a railing.

As his eyes began to blur, he could hear someone speaking to him, a familiar voice _Damian? Damian? Come on wake up!_

* * *

Victoria Queen woke up in a small office, she didn't know where she was, all she knew was that her head hurt and the last thing she remembered was a gun being armed behind her head.

"Glad to hear you're okay." A voice entered her ears

She found herself lying in a small hospital bed, she slowly stirred and woke up to an elderly male sitting at the edge of the bead, and his British accent was the most stand out part of him.

"Who are you? Where am…"

"Relax your back at Damian's home." The man spoke up "The gentlemen who tried to kill you was tied up and left for the GCPD, Mister Blake sent me to find you, and your phone gave you away."

"So who are you?"

"You may call me Alfred Pennyworth Mrs. Queen." Alfred smiled

Batman slowly began to rise, his body ached and he finally felt it, his armor began to crack and pieces began to break away, nothing that would leave him in danger of having his identity exposed but the suit would have to be trashed.

He limped over to Freeze, he lay sprawled out on the ground, he had to find it, find the cure and save his mother.

"Freeze, I know your awake." Batman growled

He flipped him over, blood stained his lips and his face as he began to wake up "Leave me to die…at least I'll be with Nora again."

"Why would you want to die when she's alive?"

"You lie!" Freeze yelled

Batman shook his head "Oracle, did you find her?"

"_Yup, she's alive, Victoria found her, but Selina…she's running out of time." _

"Fries, I need your help, someone has the disease you found a cure for, I need your cure. If there is still any form of the man who dedicated his life to save Nora…I need your help to save a life…so will you…Doctor?"

Fries grunted and pressed a button on his wrist gauntlet, out of his wrist slid the vial with the antidote, along with a second one right beside it "Take two of these…and call me in the morning."

Batman smiled "Thank you Victor."

* * *

Selina's vitals flat lined just as the cure was put into her IV, Damian took a sigh of relief as a blue light illuminated the room, he looked to Maria and Bruce who sat on the couch, Maria was passed out and Bruce smiled at his son. To his right, John stood at the door frame, with Barbara smiling, Leslie stood by Selina.

"All we can do now is wait…" Damian took his mom's hand "And hope."

**Okay, so we're drawing to the conclusion of this story and I have to say I love this story! I hope everyone is enjoying this, there are only three chapters to go and there will be the set up for the sequel, which will be out soon so stay tuned!**


	23. Chapter 23: Shaping up for the future

Damian slept on the couch in his home, Bruce and Maria got the guest rooms while Selina had access to his room, it was early in the morning and he hadn't slept at all, too worried about his mom and whether or not the cure would work, if it didn't…he would teach Freeze what an ice cube does when exposed to the sun.

Of course there was still Victoria, he didn't hear from her at all during the night, so he didn't know what was going on at all with her, he wished she could have been there, to see his mother get her cure, to meet his parents was a feat he wasn't going to like, but he hoped she would be liked.

The door to his home opened and a figure silently slipped in, their feet stepped to Damian, setting something down on the coffee table and a kiss was planted on his lips, the young Wayne opened his eyes to Victoria sitting beside his legs, a warm smile on his face.

"Hey, where did you disappear to last night?" Damian asked still exhausted

"Long story, but your grandfather is such a sweetheart." She smiled and kissed him again

"Wait…Alfred? He's here?"

"He spoke to your dad, found the Batcave and Barbara told him everything, he found me in the right time." Tori replied gently

Damian could only smile as he moved her blonde locks away from her face and gently stroked her cheek "I love you."

She smiled and opened her mouth to speak, but another voice interrupted her "Hope I'm not interrupting anything."

He looked up to Selina standing in the doorway to the living room, her brown locks were tied back in a knot and she wore a black robe tightly concealing her figure, a smile on her tired face reassured Damian of everything he feared…his mom was alive.

Tori stood up in embarrassment as Damian raced off the couch and pulled his mom into a hug, to which she returned happily "God Dami, you act like I've been dead for a year or something."

Damian pulled away "Sorry." He looked as Bruce and Maria walked down the stairs, all eyes were on him and the blonde woman who was standing in his living room with a cup of coffee in her hands.

"Right…uh….uh…Mom, Dad, Maria….this is Victoria Queen," He smiled and wrapped an arm around her hips "My girlfriend."

Victoria's face blushed as Bruce smiled at the pair, but Selina had a look of almost concern on it, Maria laughed.

"Ha! Damian has a girlfriend! He's blushing look at him!" Maria laughed and pointed at him

"Shut up Maria!" Damian almost yelled as a brother would "Now I see why I left home." He mumbled to Victoria who smiled gently and pecked him on the cheek

* * *

_Six months later…_

"Alright Mister Wayne, as of this morning, your rental will be done and your new home will be available to move into."

Damian sat on the other side of a desk, sipping from his coffee doing everything in his power to stay awake, since he only slept maybe an hour the night before, he wasn't up to snuff, but everything his realtor Avery Green was saying felt like an old cartoon where adults used to sound like random sound effects.

"Can I see?"

"Sure." Avery smiled and flipped her computer for him to see

The home looked like the old Wayne Manor, it was an old fashioned manor on the outside, sitting near the Atlantic Ocean, on the inside the manor looked brand new with navy blue walls, large windows and must have had a few dozen rooms, it really did remind Damian of Wayne Manor, though with Alfred's permission, certain of his dad's old things would be coming in while almost everything from his room would be moved into the master bedroom.

"Absolutely perfect."

The pair shook hands, if this was the start to Damian's future in Gotham; he would need his own home.

* * *

"I think the caverns from the old house continue through here."

Damian led his father and Alfred through the caverns under the new Wayne Manor, he held the lantern up as he looked around, the cavern did like his fathers have an opening through a giant waterfall, but there seemed to be a much larger area of space to operate in. Alfred stood to his right while his father was able to move freely without a cane, it was a warm surprise to see his father move around like a sixty-three year old man should, especially with his physical peak being that of a forty year old male.

"Dad, you have to show me some of your blueprints." Damian chuckled to his father

"I'll dig them up kiddo, but are you sure you want this? Being Batman…it's completely different life then what you're used to." Bruce reminded as he placed his hands in his jeans pockets

"I'm used to it…but I think I'm going to give Batman some time off, I'm gonna need a new suit and with things going the way they are right now at Wayne Enterprises….it's going to be time for a change in management."

"What did you have in mind Damian?" Alfred asked

"Oh I don't want to give anything away." Damian activated the trigger to the elevator system they found and slowly moved upwards "But let's just say Dad will know what I mean."

A smile spread on Bruce's face as he remembered how badly Earl had been humiliated when Lucius got promoted to CEO of Wayne Enterprises. He just wondered what Damian had in mind.

The elevator stopped as the trio moved out of the elevator, the house was on foreclosure but since Damian bought it, they were able to look around.

As they exited, Damian stopped Alfred "Alfred, I wanted to talk to you about something."

"You're not going to convince me not to Damian."

"Yeah, but I mean…do you really want to work for me?"

"Master Damian, in my life I served two generations of your family, your grandfather pulled me in and I had a hand in raising both you and your father, I want to make sure you don't make a bloody mess of yourself as badly as your father did when he was Batman."

Damian smiled "Still haven't given up on me have you Alfred?"

"Never." Alfred hugged him "I'll start when we move in."

* * *

The night soon descended as Damian was sitting in his new office, his cell phone up to his ear.

"You're sure Barbara? Good, that's all I wanted, give this information to your brother and Bullock when you can. It's time to end this. Tell Morgan Fox I'll call him a few minutes."

He sighed and leaned back, Alfred had already taken the night off, a date with Leslie had caused that one, Damian didn't need to be a genius to know when even the old people had to go out and play, he was glad his surrogate grandfather was playing a big role in supporting him with his life in Gotham.

As he looked out the window, the pool they had installed for him was shining from the moonlight, though he could hear something from the open window, it sounded like giggling.

He stood and ran down the stairs and out of his house to the back gardens, as he walked, the giggling continued, he didn't know what was going on…until he saw Victoria standing near the pool in a black two piece bathing suit.

"What are you doing here?" He smirked

Tori smiled at him "Wanting to go swimming….but the water keeps tickling me."

"It is sixty degrees out here and you're concerned about swimming?" Damian smirked

She walked over and wrapped her arms around his neck "Come on lover boy." She kissed him "Be Batman for one night…be daring."

"Hmmm…a compelling argument…but…"

She didn't want to hear it anymore; she immediately shed his shirt, exposing her Achilles' heel, his abs, she gently kissed him again and pulled away, teasing him as she dived into the water, Damian smiled as she came back up, moving her blonde locks away from her face; she smiled at him as he jumped in.

He gently swam over to her and cupped her face, making contact with her lips; she wrapped her arms around his neck, letting her hands stick to his head as they continued to kiss, he felt happy, stronger than ever now that she was here, in his arms, knowing as much as she did about him, knowing where's he's been, what he's done…who he is, his secret identity, he was her dark knight and she loved it.

As they parted, they simply looked into each other's eyes "Damian…I need to tell you something."

"What? Don't tell me you practically made me chase you in here and now you want to go inside?" He chuckled

"No," she laughed "no, um…I'm going back home for a while, be with my family. After Black Mask died…and everything he did…, my parents have wanted me to come home."

Damian frowned as he looked at her, here she was, this angel, the love of his life, the only woman who understood him and now she was leaving.

"When will you be back?"

"As soon as I can, they just want to make sure I'm okay, besides, they want me to train my brother in archery, and they intend to have him become the next Green Arrow."

"And what about you? What would you be?"

"I don't know, that's part of the reason why I want to go back."

"Well…you could be my Batgirl."

She smiled "No offense Damian, but I want to be my own person, not your sidekick, I want to stand out there with you, not stand there behind you while you do all the work."

Damian frowned again but was met by Tori's lips "Now I don't want to see that, don't think of this as goodbye, and just as…let's pick this up where we left off."

He nodded "That one I can buy, any chance for something I can have something to remember you by?"

She smiled and pushed him against the edge of the pool "Oh I think I can."

Damian smiled and kissed her on the lips then moved to her neck, while his head told him she was right…his heart told him that he would never see her again and that terrified him to the bone.

* * *

_Four months prior_

Roman Sionis sat in the interrogation room in Arkham Asylum, he felt content within the walls of the Asylum, he knew his organization would be taken care of with his associates, he would be released within the next few weeks, all it would take is just one phone call to his various associates outside of his organization and he would be out and back where he belonged, within the criminal underworld and slowly spreading from Gotham to beyond.

The door to his cell and a man walked inside, he wore a white lab coat, a set of full moon glasses around his grey eyes which gave a glazed look to them, his short cropped brown hair was showing signs of gray and there was a certain unbalance in his posture.

"Good afternoon Mister Sionis." The man smiled almost crookedly

"Who are you? Where the hell is Sinner?" Black Mask asked bitterly

The man straightened himself up "You may call me Arkham, Jeremiah Arkham. I run this institution."

"Oh! So you're the freakin' nut that everyone talks about. Look, why don't you just do yourself a favor Doc, and just beat it, I'm getting out."

Jeremiah laughed gently then it intensified to the point it would be considered insane, behind his mask, Roman scowled at him with a bitter hatred that could freeze Hell twice.

"What's so funny?"

He continued to laugh then calmed himself almost in an instant, the hazy look turned into a look of sociopathic torture "Oh I was just laughing at how you pathetic you sound, you sound like them…those who live here, those who claim they are sane, but in reality, you are insane! You crazy criminals think you can operate in normal society and you can't! You will be my example."

"What the hell are you…"

With lighting fast precision, Jeremiah moved and struck Roman in the throat, then grabbed his mask and ripped it off, slamming the gang leader against the wall and began to constrict his throat with his bare hands, what Roman didn't know was the cameras were off, and no one was around for miles, making this easy.

With a loud crack, the bones of Roman's neck snapped in two, as he slumped to the ground, Jeremiah smiled wickedly as he picked up the skull and held it in his hands, the door opened behind him.

The woman who opened it was tall about six feet with long brown hair that went down to her stomach with seven red ribbons in them, a warm smile spread when she saw Jeremiah.

"Well?"

"It is done, make it look like a suicide." Jeremiah looked at her "Can you do this for me Alyce?"

Alyce Sinner smiled as Jeremiah slipped an arm around her waist and kissed her, she smiled back at him, they were secret lovers, and this was just another secret that they would keep.

**Alright everyone! We're almost done with this story, I have twenty-four almost done so it should be up a little bit after this one, twenty-five or the epilogue as I'm going to call it will be up at the same time or tomorrow.**


	24. Chapter 24: The life he's earned

Paxton Powers walked up the stairs to his office, things seemed a bit more peaceful after Fries was taken down and moved to Arkham, let alone Black Mask being removed from power, all of his former associates were locked up in Arkham and Blackgate prison, aside from Penguin, Cobblepot was the only one who still survived, but he was their backer, Wayne Enterprises was staying where it was thanks to him.

"Sir, I'm sorry, the meeting has already started." Lucy spoke up from her desk

"What meeting?"

She looked down as Paxton burst the door open, inside the board members were already listening to someone new…someone sitting in his chair. Paxton growled in anger as he realized that Morgan Fox was sitting in his chair.

"Morgan, I fired you."

Morgan looked up from his half-moon glasses at Paxton "You did, but I got another job…yours."

"On whose authority?"

* * *

Damian Wayne sat in the back seat of the black Rolls Royce, Victoria Queen sat beside him, their hands locked; he felt awful that she was leaving….leaving because of him. Blake warned him, told him that Batman would make it so he did lose those he cared about; he just didn't think it would be her.

"Well, Nora Fries' recovery has been sent to page one." Alfred spoke up from the driver's seat "but Black Mask's suicide made it to page nine."

Damian took the paper from the old butler and smiled when he saw the headline F_ormer WayneTech scientist's wife makes a partial recovery. By Jack Ryder_

As he began to read, the phone in his car started to ring, Alfred set it to speaker and both he and Tori stayed silent.

"Damian Wayne?" His eyes never left the paper

"_What makes you think you can reappoint staff at Wayne Enterprises Damian?"_

He smirked as he flipped a page "Since I'm the new owner."

"_Since when?"_

"Back when you blew up at me about the whole endorsing Sharp thing, I spoke to the legal division with the help of a friend of mine." He winked at Tori "turns out that my father left the ownership of the company in his will to be appointed to his first born child."

"_Your father is dead."_

"I am well aware of that Paxton, but my father did intend to have children, the will was updated when he first started making public appearances, but the date was recorded two years after the clean energy project's failure." Damian leaned back "look, it's all a bit technical, but the important thing is that _my_ company's future is in good hands. Right Mister Fox?"

"_Right you are Mister Wayne."_

"Oh by the way Paxton, I did some digging around, turns out the large sums of our financials from WayneTech you and your associate Boyle framed Fries for were being sent to Black Mask, so you should be receiving a visitor in the next few minutes." He smiled "Consider us even." He clicked the phone off

* * *

Michael Akins and Detective Gordon entered the board room "Paxton Powers, you're under arrest for corruption and conspiracy with a convicted killer."

Paxton felt the cuffs lock around his wrists, as he looked up Morgan removed his glasses "Didn't you get the memo?"

He was dragged away as he roared in pure anger. He was escorted out of the building; everyone giving him glares and looks of surprise he was dragged to the front of the building where a cop car was sitting outside.

Akins opened the door "Have a good trip, see ya next fall."

Ferris Boyle was sitting in the seat next to him, Paxton sighed and rolled his eyes.

"How the hell did Wayne find out?" Paxton asked

"He was there when Fries got caught in the explosion." Boyle mumbled

"You freakin' idiot."

"Hey!" Gordon barked "Keep it down!"

The car began to rise with power and made its way up Main Street heading for the GCPD building.

* * *

The sounds of the airport filled his ears as Damian walked Victoria to the terminal, she checked in and he stood to the corner, he didn't want her to go, he didn't, all he wanted was to hold onto her forever and never let her go.

He held something in his and, as she walked back over to him, he quickly gripped his hand into a fist.

"Well, my plane leaves in five minutes…so I guess this is goodbye?" Tori frowned

"Don't say goodbye." Damian looked at her directly into her green eyes "If you don't say goodbye, you're not truly gone, you're just…not here right now."

She didn't have any words to say as she laced her arms around his neck and gently kissed him.

As they parted, Damian spoke up again "You do intend to come back don't you?"

She smiled "Of course, I can't leave my man behind now can I?"

He looked away "I love you." He whispered

"What did you say?" She raised an eyebrow

"I said I love you." He spoke up "I always have."

She didn't know what to say, she didn't know how she felt, these feelings she had she didn't know if they were simply because of what happened with Black Mask or if they were real.

"I love you too." She smiled back

"Then I want you to have this." He unclasped his hand

Inside was a golden key, she looked down at it, then back up at Damian then back down again.

"When you return to Gotham, I want you to feel like you have a home to come to. It's in the Palacades, far enough away from Wayne Manor, I found another cave."

"So you're moving the Batcave?"

"With things being quiet around Gotham, I think I'll have some free time coming up….maybe we can work on us?" Damian smiled

"I would like that." She took the key, clasping her hand around his and kissed him on the lips

He wanted to feel her again, just to remind him of what he was losing, he felt a lone tear slip down his cheek; Tori smiled and wiped it away.

"Now come on Damian, where's Batman? He doesn't cry."

Damian smirked "Well, you know how it goes, even scary monsters get scared."

She shook her head as she was about so speak the intercom sparked with life.

_Last call for flight number three-eighteen, Gotham City to Starling City International Airport._

"That's me." Tori looked at Damian "I'll be back, I promise."

"Good." He kissed her cheek as she began to walk away toward the door

"I'd hate to have Batman not have his canary." He walked back toward the entrance

* * *

A bright light came from the GCPD's organized unit, Gordon stood at the top when a loud banging echoed into his ears, he turned and smiled gently as Batman stood beside the flood light, and the Bat symbol sat in the middle.

"Nice." Batman nodded

For Damian, standing there in his father's old armor wasn't his favorite thing in the world but he knew his old suit was destroyed but his father's would work for right now.

"I pulled it out of the archives, figured with you back…we'd need it." Gordon smiled

"Well Detective…"

"It's Lieutenant now, I got a promotion for stopping Powers and Boyle from causing anymore corruption within Gotham, not to mention my work with Black Mask's thugs." Gordon smiled "I wanted to say thank you."

Batman had turned to the other side of the roof about to jump "For what?"

"For saving my life…it's what I've wanted to talk to you for a while now…" Gordon got a bit closer "I don't know if you remember, about thirty years ago…you saved my life from almost being killed by Harvey Dent…you took a bullet for us, me and my family…"

"Gordon stop." Batman held a hand up "I'm not the man who saved you….I'm simply his successor."

"I know, somehow I've always known that you were not him, I still wanted to say thank you."

"You won't have to; just make sure Akins doesn't try to arrest me for a while." Batman nodded

Gordon nodded back as he watched Batman jump off the roof and glide into the air.

* * *

Selina Kyle stood overlooking Wayne Enterprises, a content smile sat on her face as she knew her son had done everything it could, now it was time for her to go back to where she belongs…back in the shadows.

"You're really leaving?"

She turned to Batman standing before her, she knew it was her son, even though he wore his father's armor, she could always see the little boy in a black batman shirt doing the little "tt" motion with his nose whenever he was frustrated.

"Yup…your father thinks it's time to go back."

"You know, we never did get that sparing match in." Damian smiled

"Well then kiddo, while I'm here. Let's get it done, see if the cat is in you like the bat."

Batman smiled as they began to move, their feet moved in opposite direction of each other in a circle "I always thought I was a cat with bat's wings sticking out of the back and desire for shiny objects and fighting in Kevlar with a graphite mask."

She smiled "Don't let your father tell you anything less, you are definitely our son."

Catwoman immediately went on the offensive as Batman blocked the attack, this was his life, and he was the son of a legend.

**Alright, I was going to have this be a twenty-five chapter story but I decided that since the first section was so short, I decided to just add them both into one bigger chapter. I do really have to say thank you for everyone who has given this story such praise these last few months, you all are the reason why I continued to write this story and now that its done, I feel upset, but I know all good things much come to an end, but just be on the look out within the next few weeks.**

**And it is with great joy that I unveil my plan, I plan on doing two things, first, expect to see a Superman story coming up soon following the Man of Steel verse followed by Batman sequel, then just as big of an announcement this was at Comic-Con this past year, I plan on doing a team up of the world's finest sons and give them a fight worth fighting for followed by a Justice League story with doing a back story for each member! So stay tuned for the future stories and again, thank you all so much!**


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